Betty Gernert is a leader of Epiphany Ministry, a Christian ministry to incarcerated youths based in Danville, Ga.

Joe Benton is a special assistant for faith-base initiatives at the 7th District AME Church of South Carolina. In 2005, the church and the state’s department of juvenile justice signed an agreement to work together to benefit children in the state’s juvenile justice system or at risk of entering it.

Michael Rickenbaker is the general chaplain of Christian Prisoner Fellowship in Hazelwood, Mo. The Pentecostal-based ministry has an outreach program to juvenile offenders.

Scott Larson is an adjunct professor of Christian ministries at Gordon College in Wenham, Mass. In 2009, Gordon became the first Christian college to offer a major in juvenile justice ministries. Larson is the primary instructor for the school’s juvenile justice ministries courses and the co-founder and president of Straight Ahead Ministries, a faith-based organization that works with […]

Sister Janet Harris is a Roman Catholic nun and a nationally recognized advocate for juvenile justice reform. She is the founder of InsideOUT Writers, a writers program for incarcerated juveniles in Los Angeles detention centers, where she was once a chaplain.

Read is a Nov. 12, 2009, essay about the religious element to sentencing juveniles to life without parole posted at Sightings by Joan Gottschall, a U.S. district judge for the Northern District of Illinois and a member of the Visiting Committee to the University of Chicago Divinity School.

Read an April 13, 2010, post by Jesuit priest John Coleman at the blog of America magazine about the possibility of sentencing juveniles to life without parole.

The Youth For Christ Juvenile Justice Ministries reaches out to youth in detention centers, group homes, correctional center and more to engage them in “relational outreach.” The ministry emphasizes  spiritual, physical, mental and emotional growth. Contact Jake Bland.

Breakaway Outreach is a faith-based nonprofit that works with young offenders in a juvenile detention center ministry. It was co-founded by Jimmy Larche, who says his life was changed by faith when he was a teenager in a juvenile detention center.