FCBH in Togo’s prisons: a seed, a tree and many fruits

TOGO — “Jesus totally changed my life, so much so that I have more good memories of my time in prison than bad ones.” This former prisoner, Dieudonné, is just one of many whose time in prison is being transformed through the Bible Society of Togo’s thriving Faith Comes By Hearing (FCBH) ministry.

Dieudonné was imprisoned in Kande, 466 kms north of Lomé. He quickly gained a reputation for being a tough man and a leader among the prison community. Towards the end of his imprisonment, Bible Society staff visited the prison and brought with them the New Testament on audio cassette. Naturally, Dieudonné was appointed to lead the listening sessions.

“For that first listening session, we chose a cassette at random,” he explains. “It talked about forgiveness. This was a difficult subject for me, especially in relation to my stepmother, who I felt had been one of the people responsible for my ending up in prison. After listening to the cassette, though, I felt I had to forgive her. I also wondered whether this would open up the path to freedom for me. Two months later my sentence was cut short and I returned home. The anger I felt towards my stepmother disappeared as soon as I saw her.

“Now I know that life shapes us, society destroys us and prison reforms us. But it’s Jesus who transforms us.”

In May, Bible Society staff visited the prison in Kara, 413 kms north of Lomé, too. Here they met Alexandre, another prisoner whose life has been transformed by the FCBH program which began there after the Bible Society supplied one set of cassettes in French and another in Kabyè, and the prisoners organised themselves into several listening groups.

“I can hardly find the words to tell you how much we enjoy listening to God speaking to us in Kabyè through these cassettes,” he told General Secretary the Rev Wolanyo Amegah. “All I can say is that, for us, the FCBH program is a seed, a tree and many fruits.”