Bakom dubbla murar

In the prison of Kumla, Sweden`s highest security classified institution, spiritual retreats are pursued since 2001. The aim is to offer the inmates a possibility to enter deeply into spiritual contemplation. This spiritual contemplation is made possible through the fact that the prisoners carry out a retreat designed after guidelines written by Ignatius of Loyola in his Spiritual Exercises. The purpose of this examination is to study how ordinary institutional life in comparison to monastic life defines and creates different attitudes and roles amongst the inmates. A secondary aim is to describe the consequences of the retreat on individual basis. This examination is based on qualitative interviews and field studies carried out in Kumla as well as documents written by inmates who have pursued a retreat. The theoretical framework is taken from four sociologists whose theoretical work has its foundation in symbolic interactionism: Herbert Blumer, Erving Goffman, Howard S Becker and Randall Collins. The conclusion that is drawn in the examination is that the two systems with their special preferences create necessary conditions for the inmates to develop diverse roles. The examination clearly shows that the role created within the institution is recreated to something else in the monastery. The inmates who have pursued a retreat all show a profound change concerning attitudes towards themselves as well as their environment. The problem is how to maintain this positive attitude and to integrate it in daily life in the long run. The persons who have pursued a longer retreat have all developed various strategies to be able to maintain and recreate the positive role developed within the monastery but these strategies are met with hostility. Alas, it seems very difficult for the inmates to resist the negative influence they are subjected to on returning to the ordinary institutional life, or in extension to a life in freedom.

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