News
June 17, 2026
June 2026
Ordinary broken men
Jeremy Beavon's father-in-law did prison ministry for 20 years. Jeremy thought it was a strange thing to do. Something he could never do.
Nine years ago, a friend talked him into giving it a go.
Jeremy is now one of the volunteers who shows up every Monday evening at Pathway's Navigate Unit, part of a Faith Support Group that has been running Bible study, discipleship, and pastoral care for the Tū Ora for years. The group was established when Pathway launched the Navigate Initiative and asked Steve Wyllie, who had spent years running church services inside Christchurch Men's Prison, to bring that same presence into the unit.
What draws both men back, week after week, is not straightforward to explain. But Jeremy puts it plainly.
"We're all guys walking life together," he says. "There is no hierarchy of guys who haven't been in prison and those that have."
Steve describes it the same way, in different words.
"Ordinary broken men," he says, "bringing a message of love, forgiveness, healing, restoration, and hope, to other broken men like me."
That framing matters. The group does not arrive at the Navigate Unit from a position of distance. The volunteers understand something about carrying weight, and about what it takes to imagine a different kind of life.
Many of the Tū Ora arrive at the group uncertain. Some have been involved in gangs. Some don't yet know whether another way of living is possible for them, or where it would even begin.
Jeremy remembers one man who came along out of obligation. He stayed. Over the weeks that followed, something shifted. After he was released, Jeremy introduced him to his parents. The four of them had dinner together. At one point, Jeremy's father turned to the man and asked whether he'd always been so gentle.
"No," the man said. "Definitely not."
Jeremy later had the privilege of baptising him.
For Steve, who has been doing this work for about 15 years, first as an assistant Chaplain inside the prison and then with the Navigate Unit since the initiative began, stories like that one are the reason he keeps coming back.
"Doing this work is as much of a blessing to us as it is for the men we work with," he says.
On the 15th of June, the Faith Support Group was presented with a Volunteer Recognition Award by Volunteering Canterbury. Jeremy says the recognition will mean something to the volunteers. Personally, though, he is focused elsewhere.
"I just like doing the work," he says, "and doing it for an audience of one: Jesus."
The Monday evenings continue.
Names have been changed.
