Prayer

For those of us whose apostolate is within the world, the prayerful power and contemplative intercessions of the religious has our back, for they are a mighty arm of the Church and their prayer is one of the sharpest swords of the Word, now as it was centuries ago, when St. Teresa of Avila wrote these words: "I think we should act as people do when, in time of war, the enemy has overrun the country and the king finds himself hard pressed. He retires into a strongly fortified town from whence he sometimes makes a sortie. The small company with him in the citadel, being picked men, are better than a large army of cowardly soldiers; thus they often come off victors, they are not vanquished for there is no traitor in their ranks and famine alone can conquer them. No famine can force us to surrender--it may kill us--it cannot vanquish us! But why have I told you this? To teach you, my sisters, that we must ask God to grant that, of all the good Christians in this fort, none may desert to the enemy, that no traitor may be found here, and that the captains of this castle, or city--that is, the preachers and theologians--may be proficient in the way of our Lord. Since most of these are religious, you must pray that they may advance in perfection and may follow their vocation more perfectly. This is very necessary, for, as I said, it is the arm of the Church and not of the State which much defend us now. We, being women, can fight for our King in neither way: Let us, then, strive so to live that our prayers may avail to help these servants of God who have laboured hard to arm themselves with learning and virtue with which to help their Sovereign." The Way of Perfection, [1565]. (1997). Rockford, Illinois: Tan Books and Publishers. (pp. 16-17)

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The Church

760 Christians of the first centuries said, "The world was created for the sake of the Church." God created the world for the sake of communion with his divine life, a communion brought about by the "convocation" of men in Christ, and this "convocation" is the Church. The Church is the goal of all things, and God permitted such painful upheavals as the angels' fall and man's sin only as occasions and means for displaying all the power of his arm and the whole measure of the love he wanted to give the world.

Just as God's will is creation and is called "the world," so his intention is the salvation of men, and is called "the Church." (Catechism of the Catholic Church, #760)

Community & Public Education

Our third goal is "to educate the business and professional community about the leadership capability of educated, transformed criminals and the use of Catholic social teaching as a transformative tool" and what we do to accomplish this is to participate, through writing, speaking, and professional association memberships, in those venues that in some way will reach those communities.

Over the past five years Lampstand has been involved in the following ways:

1) December 2006: First ebook, The Criminal's Search for God: Criminal Transformation, Catholic Social Teaching, Deep Knowledge Leadership, and Communal Reentry was published by Chulu Press. (Free to Members)

2) March 2007: Authored the First Annual St. Dismas Feast Day Policy Primer: The Lampstand Foundation's Mission: Terms Defined, Thesis Formulation, Policy Primer. (Members Only)

3) September 2007: Became a member of Scholars for Social Justice.

4) October 2007: Authored Guiding Principles for Criminal Justice.

5) October 2007: Became a member of the Society of Catholic Social Scientists.

6) November 2007: Became a member of the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars.

7) November 2007: Second ebook, Carceral World, Communal City was published by Chulu Press. (Free to Members)

8) January 2008: Paper, Criminal Reentry and Criminal Reformation was accepted for a panel presentation at the 2008 Conference of the Western Society of Criminology: "Social Justice: Informing Evidence-Based Policy & Planning".

9) January 2008: Article, OD, The Natural Language of Human Service Nonprofits: Congruence and Opportunity, was published in Practicing the bi-monthly e-zine of the OD Network.

10) March 2008: Authored the Second Annual St. Dismas Feast Day Policy Primer: Catholic Social Teaching & Capital Punishment: A Tradition of Support. (Members Only)

11) May 2008: Authored the first Lampstand Periodic Monograph: Capital Punishment & Matthew 18:6. (Members Only)

12) July 2008: Authored a review of the book: Criminal Justice and the Catholic Church, by Andrew Skotnicki (2007). The review was published by the Acton Institute in their Journal of Markets & Morality, Spring 2008 Issue. http://www.acton.org/publications/mandm/

13) August 2008: Accepted an appointment to the Sacramento Interagency Council to End Homelessness and served on the Criminal Justice Committee. http://www.communitycouncil.org/homelessplan/interagency.html

14) October 2008: The Criminal's Search for God, the first book published by Lampstand in December of 2006 as an ebook (available from Lampstand), is now available as a paperback from Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Criminals-Search-God-Transformation-Leadership/dp/0979167027/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1225757848&sr=8-1

15) November 2008: Became a member of the Catholic Social Workers National Association.

16) December 2008: In the Company of Saints At Christmastime, an article was published on the Catholic Eye weblog on Christmas Day http://catholiceye.blogspot.com/2008/12/in-company-of-saints-at-christmastime.html

17) January 2009: Carceral World, Communal City, the second book published by Lampstand in December of 2007 as an e-book (available from Lampstand), is now available as a paperback from Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Carceral-World-Communal-David-Lukenbill/dp/0979167051/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1232238826&sr=8-1

18) February 2009: The Criminal, The Cross, & The Church, the third book published by Lampstand in December of 2008 as an e-book (available from Lampstand) and a paperback, is now available from Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Criminal-Cross-Church-Interior-Journey/dp/097916706X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=book&qid=1233698679&sr=1-1

19) March 2009: Work quoted in article in Theology Today, Volume 66, Number 1, April 2009. By the Secret Ladder: Christian Mysticism and Liberation of the Imprisoned, by Andrew Skotnicki. (pp. 33-44) http://theologytoday.ptsem.edu/

20) March 2009: Authored the Third Annual St. Dismas Feast Day Policy Primer: Justice, Theology, Criminal Transformation & Pope Pius XII (Members Only)

21) July 2009: Capital Punishment & Catholic Social Teaching: A Tradition of Support, the fourth book published by Lampstand in July of 2009 as an e-book and paperback (free to Lampstand members) and the paperback can be ordered from Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Capital-Punishment-Catholic-Social-Teaching/dp/0979167078/ref=sr_1_1&ie=UTF8&qid=1249062090&sr=8-1

22) December 2009: Authored the paper, Capital Punishment and the Constancy of Catholic Social Teaching, which was accepted by the Thirteenth Annual Conference of the Scholars for Social Justice and published in the November-December 2009 issue (Vol. 100, No. 11-12) of Social Justice Review, http://socialjusticereview.org/articles/capital-punishment-and-the-constancy-of-catholic-social-teaching

23) March 25, 2010: Authored the Fourth Annual St. Dismas Feast Day Policy Primer: Unpacking the Catholic Reentry Program Model (Members Only)

24) May 23, 2010: Interviewed for Our Sunday Visitor Newsweekly In Focus Prison Ministry issue (5/23/10), which was published in an article entitled: Ex-prisoner uses Catholic teaching to break 'criminal world culture' on page 12. www.osv.com

25) January 11, 2011: Lampstand was written about on the CatholicCulture website by Dr. Jeff Mirus, at http://www.catholicculture.org/commentary/otc.cfm?id=757

26) February 1, 2011: Invictus: The Way of the Apostolate, the fifth book published by Lampstand, in December of 2010 as an e-book and paperback (free to Lampstand members) and the paperback can be ordered from Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Invictus-Way-Apostolate-David-Lukenbill/dp/0979167035/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1296601355&sr=8-2

27) March 25, 2011: Authored the Fifth Annual St. Dismas Feast Day Policy Primer: The Prison Ministry (Members Only)

28) April, 2011: Authored the paper, The Prison Ministry, which was accepted for publication by Social Justice Review in the November-December 2010 issue (Vol. 101, No. 11-12, pp. 172-175)

29) January 2012: The Lampstand Prison Ministry: Constructed on Catholic Social Teaching & the History of the Catholic Church, the sixth book published by Lampstand, in December of 2011 as an e-book and paperback (free to Lampstand members) and the paperback can be ordered from Amazon http://www.amazon.com/Lampstand-Prison-Ministry-Constructed-Catholic/dp/0979167086/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1325104327&sr=8-6