Washing of Their Feet Touches Inmates’ Hearts

Thursday was the best day of Anthony Ybarra’s life.

He was in jail, didn’t know when he would see his 2-week-old son, Noah Anthony, and was crying hard.

But a priest who had once been an inmate at the same jail was washing his feet, just as Jesus did for his 12 surprised disciples at the Last Supper.

Father John McAndrew cleaned and kissed Ybarra’s feet, along with those of 11 other prisoners, during a Holy Thursday Catholic service at Theo Lacy Branch Jail in Orange.

And retired Bishop Norman F. McFarland, who has revealed a new side of himself to others through his transforming experiences with jail inmates, then heard Ybarra’s confession.

“My heart is still pounding,” said Ybarra, 37, after his confession to the former head of the Diocese of Orange. “Things just flowed out. He told me God loves me no matter what I’ve done. Something just came over me--a peace.

“The feeling is a better high than any drugs I’ve had,” said Ybarra, who has been in the jail since January on a drug-related charge. “It was quite a surprise. This service is the best thing that’s happened to my life so far.”

Sunset on Thursday marked the beginning of triduum, the three holiest days of the Christian year that commemorate the death and resurrection of Christ.

At the jail, the services took place in a stark chapel. White plastic chairs served as pews. Four sheriff’s deputies took the place of ushers. And between squawks on the deputies’ radios, the prisoners sang, took Communion, joined hands and got down on their knees on the polished concrete floors to pray. And they cried--often.

“This is a wonderful moment,” McFarland told the 28 inmates in orange jumpsuits gathered for one of two afternoon Masses. “There are very few times in our lives where we can say we’re doing exactly what God wants us to do.”

The story of McFarland, known more for his gruff manner than tender heart, and the inmates at Theo Lacy goes back three years, when the bishop faced a life-threatening aneurysm.

At the time, jail Chaplain Leia Smith had the prisoners write get-well letters to McFarland, a man she knew mostly by his intimidating reputation.

“There was a part of me saying, ‘Here’s a way for Bishop McFarland to hear the voices of the inmates,’ ” Smith said. “I could not have expected all that happened because of those letters.”

Both Smith and McFarland can recite by heart one of those 40 letters, which reads in part:

“Dear Bishop McFarland,

“Hi, there, Norman. I’m a prisoner here in Theo Lacy because of something I’ve done. You’re a prisoner because of your health.”

The writer went on to tell the bishop that he was praying for him because he could identity with being helpless.

The direct, informal missives touched McFarland. He got hundreds of get-well cards, but he saved only the ones from the prisoners.

“In a very particular way, I was touched by them,” McFarland said.

Smith soon heard rumors that McFarland was showing the letters to friends and associates.

Auxiliary Bishop Jaime Soto said McFarland interrupted one of their conversations to show him one of the letters.

“He’d start reading it,” Soto recalled. “And who knows how many times he’d read it, but each time he did, there was almost a renewed amazement. [The prisoners] speak so transparently toward him. They spoke right to his heart.”

McFarland soon accepted an invitation to visit the inmates, his first jail visit during his 11-year tenure as bishop of Orange.

He gave a homily on Christ’s conversation with the two criminals who were crucified alongside him. The inmates gave the bishop a standing ovation.

“It was hard to tell at that moment who was more moved,” McAndrew said. “Beginning with that experience, there was some sort of connection that spoke to some place inside of him that no one ever got access to.”

Smith’s opinion of the bishop began to change that day.

“He intimidated the heck out of me,” Smith said. “But Norman McFarland is an incredibly wonderful human being, and I wish I had known this side of him [before he retired in 1998].”

Father McAndrew also sees a change.

“He’s a different man today than he was a few years ago,” he said, “and I think this was a significant part of it.”

McAndrew knows about personal change. A recovering alcoholic, he is open about the drunken driving arrest that landed him in jail 19 years ago, before he entered the priesthood.

But McFarland himself contends that he hasn’t changed much, except for being freed of running a complex organization like the Diocese of Orange, which has $150 million in assets.

“My one ambition in life was to became a parish priest,” said McFarland, who downplays his role at the jail as merely volunteering a few hours each month. “And then I was told to do other things [as an administrator]. The parish priest role is the most glorious role, to be an instrument in God’s hand.”

Whatever the case, having a bishop come into the jail on a regular basis means a lot to the inmates, many of whom lack a father figure that McFarland represents.

“It sums up what I believe,” said Geoffrey Blaylock, a 23-year-old inmate. “That we all have the same heart.”