When Brother Leslie Fife (Oklahoma, 1988) tells people that his career in IT has ended up with him in the Utah prison system, they tend to shy away and assume that something bad happened along the way but, in reality, what he is doing in the Utah prison system is about giving back. He’s giving inmates an opportunity to express their Judaism and celebrate the Jewish holidays.

A varied career in IT led him to working for a defense contractor, writing software for the F-16. “I did software development for a couple of years at General Dynamics, and I was actually in Tel Aviv doing the delivery when Hussein invaded Kuwait (1990). That was an exciting month!” After earning his master’s degree and PhD, he began a teaching career which took him to Oklahoma City University, BYU, Hawaii and then LSU-Shreveport. He eventually remarried and began a new career as a cyber-security analyst and moved to Utah.

“I’ve been in the Civil Air Patrol for about 10 years, and I was a ‘Chaplain Support guy.’ They call it a ‘character development instructor.’ And, the wing chaplain asked me if I had ever considered being a chaplain and I laughed because I’m a tech guy, right?”

“Someone mentioned that they have a need in the state prison system and my wife, who was with me, told me that that was where I needed to be. So, I said, ok and that was about two years ago.”

While there aren’t a lot of Jewish inmates in the Utah state prison system, there are about 40 different faith groups, and all of the inmates are able to seek out those who can help them with their religious journey.

“There are typically about 20-30 inmates who practice Judaism throughout all of the different facilities across the state. So, a lot of their worship has to be individual worship. I’m not sure how many of them were raised Jewish – probably very few – and they can’t read Hebrew very well, but that’s the faith they’ve selected, and we want to support them in it. We held several different Seders this year because we have to do it in each unit. I had a recorded Seder from during COVID so I would go and play that, and the Religious Services department gave us some of the items to use in their worship. The inmates were very appreciative of it.”

Faith, a belief in G-d, and maybe his AEPi experiences led Leslie to this calling. “A lot of this began in AEPi at Oklahoma. I went to Shabbat services on Friday night and learned so much about Judaism and how different people practice it through my AEPi brothers. My best memories of AEPi, though, were our regular Sunday afternoons and evenings together. We had dinner together and then a chapter meeting. It became a part of my weekend ritual!”

“I’ve worked with a couple of people in the system who feel thrown away by society and abandoned by their family and their faith group, and just walking with them as they make their journey has been very rewarding.

You know, and I’ve got my own faith path to walk, and theirs are often very different. And I’m just there to accompany them and support them so that they can have the space and the time and resources to do what they need to do.”

#ProudtobeaPi

(Editor’s Note: Brother Fife is raising funds to purchase siddurim, kippot and other Jewish ritual materials for those he works with. If you’d like to support him, you can email him at [email protected]).