The Catholic faith teaches that an omnipotent God provides men with constant evidence of Himself in created realities. He can be found everywhere at all times, and He made himself known to Chris Gay at one of the lowest points in his life.
After Gay arrived at the London Correctional Institution in Madison County in February 2022, he weighed a puny 118 pounds and was strung out on drugs after being sentenced in Jackson County to 4 ½ years in prison on two counts of theft and failure to comply.
Despite being only in his early 30s, he wanted to die.
“I just needed to get back to God,” he said. “I actually came down here (to the prison chapel) crying to myself (and was) like, ‘Hey, listen, I’m going to kill myself, or I just need a sign or something, please.”
Growing up in Wellston, where his family attended a fundamentalist church, Gay knew about Jesus but didn’t feel drawn to the faith. In his younger years, some Catholic friends had tried to persuade him to come to church, but he had doubts.
Now, years later, after his life had spiraled out of control and finding himself incarcerated, he left the prison chapel on that day shortly after his arrival looking for a sign from God. He saw a copy of the Catholic devotional “Give Us This Day” in the hallway.
“I felt like someone breathed on the back of my neck,” Gay recalled. “So, I looked at it and said, ‘OK, I’m going to try this.’”
He read through the booklet several times and decided to go talk to Father Michael Hinterschied, then the chaplain at London Correctional.
“So, we met a couple of times, and he introduced me to everyone at Mass,” Gay said. “After that first Mass, Father Hinterschied said, ‘Listen, start coming to Mass a couple of times and see if you like it. Then if you feel like it, we can start having some Catechism classes.’ That was 14 months ago.”
Gay said he read the Catechism of the Catholic Church in two weeks and found it to be “incredible” and “beautiful.”
“So, for me, personally, learning about the faith, it touched something inside of me. I’m finally convinced and have become a strong believer that this is a deep faith,” the inmate said.
Gay, 33, shared his conversion story in an interview after Bishop Earl Fernandes celebrated Mass for the inmates on Saturday, June 10, the Vigil of the Solemnity of Corpus Christi, with Father Pat Toner, the prison chaplain, and with assistance from Deacon Dan Hann.
The bishop, in his homily, alluded to the omnipotence of God manifested through His Son, Jesus, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity, in the true Body and Blood revealed in the Blessed Sacrament.
“I want to tell you how glad I am to be here,” Bishop Fernandes said. “Jesus is the Good Shepherd, and I am here to remind you of this and to tell you how close you are to my heart.
“The Good Shepherd goes, and He finds the sheep, and He rejoices having found them and brings them home. So, I want you to know how the people of the Diocese of Columbus pray for you and how I pray for you and how happy I am to be able to share in the Lord’s Supper with you, to be able to offer Mass with you and for you, and to pray for the forgiveness of sins and for the redemption of the world. …
“Jesus said, ‘I am the Bread of Life. Anyone who eats of this lives forever. Jesus wants to give us life, and God wants to bring us salvation in the flesh.”
Jesus, the Word Made Flesh, was received at Mass by Gay and approximately 20 other inmates, some of whom went to confession to the bishop beforehand and participated in Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament afterward.
The Eucharist has impacted Gay profoundly, he said, after receiving the sacraments of baptism and confirmation on Dec. 29, 2022 from Father Hinterschied in prison.
“I had to experience what Father Hinterschied called ‘the discipline of waiting’ because when I first went to church, I wanted to get up there and take communion,” Gay said. “And he said, ‘Well, we’ll talk about this.’ And I had to accept that it was OK.
“During the discipline of waiting and learning about it – that it’s fully Jesus – it makes us strive to do the best we can just to consider being worthy to take the Eucharist, to be able to take Jesus sacramentally into my body.
“It’s just like the pope said at Christmas that Jesus was born and placed into a manger to be our food. Jesus was truly there to nourish us, to be what we can’t be on our own.”
Asked how the Eucharist has affected him personally, Gay responded, “In the biggest ways. Truly, this is the center of our faith and, as Catholics here in the prison, we look forward to this every Saturday (at Mass).”
Being part of a Catholic community with other inmates brings Gay comfort as well.
“You know, I ain’t got much of a family,” he said. “I have a little girl, and I try to explain it to her, but now I have a whole list of people who are my brothers to hang out with, and I’m starting to grow more in faith. … Not only the brothers here, but the volunteers who come in, from Father (Toner) and now from Bishop (Fernandes).
“It’s a great thing, it’s a beautiful thing. And I know there’s more out there. I’m a drug addict, and there are programs like Catholics in Recovery that are there to help.”
Gay will not be eligible for parole until 2025, but he’s already looking forward to the day when he’s released and can restart his life outside the prison fences as a Catholic. He plans to enroll in an addiction recovery program in Portsmouth as part of his transition back into society.
“But the first thing I’m going to do is to get registered in a parish,” Gay said. “Because, first, I feel like I’m the leper in Matthew, Chapter 8, who came to Jesus and said, ‘If you wish, you can make me healed, and I will be made clean.’
“So, for me, after finding a better way – the right way – I will be the one leper who comes back and says, ‘Thank you,’ and gets involved in something good somehow.”
Bishop Fernandes offered Gay and all of the incarcerated men a message of encouragement in his homily.
“My brothers, you are here in this place, but the Lord is with you,” he said. “The Blessed Sacrament is a sign that He is with us and wants to come and dwell in your soul. This is our God Who loves you. He is not afraid to come and love you.
“Even here, Jesus comes down into your midst to tell you that God loves you. And, in making the ultimate sacrifice, He said, ‘I will prove how much I love them by my suffering.’
“God comes at each and every Mass. He comes, bends down and washes our feet. … In the mystery of the Eucharist, Jesus comes to us to heal us. So never lose hope. In Jesus Christ there is always hope.”
