Religious behavior of convicts as a means of their correction

Peculiarity of prisoners' correction is connected with the system of criminal stratification and norms of criminal subculture that exist in their environment: committing illegal acts for them is habitual, ordinary. Traditional means of correction are connected with the formation of non-criminal behavior on the verge of legitimacy and criminality - marginal or conformist lawful behavior. On the one hand, achievement of such objectives is a parameter of positive dynamics of the development of a person, on the other hand, it is a weak guarantee of the further lawful way of life of the prisoner after release. It is connected with the fact that outside of a penal institution there are no deterrents which do not allow the marginal behavior to transform into the illegal one, which causes a high level of post-penal recidivism. Correction should not cover exclusively the penal sphere of activity of the prisoner and be shown only in preventing penal recidivism. Correction of prisoners should consist in creation of strong, stable motives for not committing a crime after release, irrespectively from the chance of responsibility for its committing. It is required to shape the prisoner's socially-active model of the lawful behavior based on the internal conviction of the person in the inadmissibility of committing a crime. Thus, it is necessary to consider the fact that the motivation of behavior of prisoners with its external positivism can have a marginal, not socially-active character. Traditional means of correction are perceived negatively by prisoners because they have a forced character, religion acts as a buffer between prisoners and the administration, religious ideas are common for prisoners and influence them positively. Spiritual and moral work of the Church essentially supplements, if not replaces the educational service of penal institutions, for clergymen and their assistants give this question of more time than the administration does. Unlike cooperation with the administration of a penal institution, cooperation with representatives of religious organizations is not reprehensible in the criminal world. Religion is a connecting link between the criminal and legal cultures of prisoners. Unlike traditional means of correction (educational work, socially useful work, general education, vocational training and professional influence), participation of the convicted prisoner in the activity of religious organizations is directed on the formation of internal psychological orientations preventing further crimes not for the fear of responsibility, but from the comprehension of inadmissibility of such actions. This influence is directed on the formation of a socially-active lawful behavior described by the most advanced stage of the positive motivation of the person.

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