The Christian Science Monitor

‘I have to have humility’: How Second Commandment helped man find freedom

Desmon ‘Dez’ Rogers, shown on Oct. 20, 2019, in Philadelphia, says he hopes he can help younger men learn earlier in life what he learned the hard way.

Desmon “Dez” Rogers is the first to tell you about his long run-in with the Second Commandment. About how the false idols he bowed down to as he toggled for 30 years between the life of the streets and the life behind bars ultimately brought him to his knees. About how his thirst for money and for the feelings of validation it brought him turned out to be what he calls “grenade love” – attachments with lethal consequences. And about how, ironically, it was while imprisoned that the now middle-aged screen processor came to discover the freedom he sought for decades.

Mr. Rogers spoke to the Monitor at a well-worn drug treatment house in North Philadelphia as part of our series examining the ways traditional religious codes like the Ten Commandments continue

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