Dayton Moore entered the ECF Spiritual Life Center and shook hands with the congregation along the way toward a podium embellished with a Kansas City Royals crown in his honor.
The general manager of the Royals, though, never stepped up on the stage for his speaking engagement Dec. 19 in the building seasonably adorned with special lighting, wreaths and Christmas trees.
Instead, he simply walked around the front of the room, essentially among the population within ECF: the Ellsworth (Kan.) Correctional Facility.
The high-medium security institution is one notch below maximum, warden Martin Sauers said, and it houses men convicted of murder and rape as well as lesser crimes. Some will be here forever, but most will return to society.
Men like James, who during Moores nearly two-hour visit asked an astute question about how he might deal with a star player whose negative spirit affects everyone in the locker room.
When Moore praised the question and said it was one worthy of his own staff, James replied, Im available in April. Moore smiled while much of the room broke up laughing.
That was just one of the ways Moore connected with a mostly riveted audience of about 200 or so including counselors and a corrections officer who kept leaving the room to jot down notes. Beyond Moores voice, about the only noise was the rhythmic clacking of a loose fan and some occasional squawk over an officers radio.
Many of the men in their facility-issued gray T-shirts and denim leaned forward in their seats. There were amens and mm-hmms and nods and contemplative hands in chins and eyes fixed on a man whose strongest message and perhaps greatest gift is empathy.
You could sense it in his exchanges as he took questions for more than an hour after his initial speech, including his response to one inmate who asked about how to move forward.
I cannot let the troubles of the past infect what I have to do in the moment, Moore said, fixing his gaze on the questioner. See, my interaction with you, for those 30 seconds, was very positive. You made a positive impression on me.
Reiterating the point to the grateful man moments later, Moore talked about his Christian faith and his family as his greatest priorities in life, but added this: You know what the most important thing in the world to me right now is? The most important thing in the world to me right now is you guys. Because thats where I am. Thats where I am.
Delight in where you are. Make the best of where you are.
You could feel his compassion, too, as he spoke afterward individually with several offenders he later said were contrite. The last of them confided in Moore his obsession with measuring himself by the money he made … and his notion that selling drugs was the only way to make as much as he wanted.
After Moore tried to reassure him this worth to society isnt whether he makes money but what kind of father he is to his three children, Moore put his hand on the inmates shoulder and prayed with him.
If it seems improbable that Moore might relate to this audience, its not. For many reasons, including the geniality and curiosity and authenticity that enable him to connect with almost anyone.
