Finding Beauty Behind Bars – Book Review
Finding Beauty Behind Bars, by Revd Tim Hewes, April 2025. Darton Longman and Todd Ltd, ISBN: 978-1-917362-09-2, 160 pages. RRP: £12.99 (paperback)
Reading an account of a grandfather with high blood pressure who in the middle of a Sunday afternoon is arrested and taken in handcuffs to Wormwood Scrubs Prison, you might expect some anger, rage or at the very least, frustration, but Tim seems to take it in his stride. His patient, almost deadpan, style of writing suggests that being in prison was no big deal.
Yet the anger and anxiety are there. “Time to switch to survival mode.”
Tim Hewes, a retired dentist, priest and climate activist, who had taken part in numerous nonviolent actions with groups such as Just Stop Oil, was accused of conspiring to commit public nuisance by bringing traffic on the M25 to a halt. As a repeat offender he was held on remand for six weeks during which time he kept a diary.
As we read, so Tim shares with us the ways in which he learned to cope, ways of developing “inner resources and outer community.” Mantras: “Find beauty, be still” and “On the other side of fear lies our strength”; messages of encouragement from friends and strangers: “I read some emails to placate my anger”; the unexpected kindness of a prison officer or fellow prisoner; a blessing from the chaplain: “because I want to feel anything God has to offer me”; and a sheer determination not to get bogged down by dark thoughts: “I chose to be a person who seeks for beauty in any of its forms, hopefully allowing it to strengthen me.”
Near the beginning of the book, Tim jokes about needing to plan a retreat. The cell he gets may not be what he had had in mind but by the end of the book he writes “‘God is in this place’ where I was in prison and where I am today. In the melee and turmoil of these times, I’d lost sight of that. My enforced retreat has enabled me to regain that certainty and when I waver, I have people I can trust to hold that certainty, that hope, the ‘Christ light’ for me.”
Whilst, as his bishop reminded him, to be a prophet is a difficult and lonely role to inhabit, so Tim reminds us that as climate activists we share a resilience that comes from being a community. Thank you Tim.
Judith Russenberger
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