Offenders leaving prison are often said to have "paid for their mistakes"—or, worse yet, to have "paid their debt to society." In fact, of course, they have not paid their debts at all in most cases, since the existing system does not usually provide for repayments by offenders to their victims. In a free society, the offender would have the opportunity and the obligation to repay his or her debt, insofar as it could ever be repaid, thereby becoming a moral participant in society again. In cases of offenders affected by mental illness, such repayment is essential to rebuilding healthy self-esteem and therefore becomes an indispensable element in a rational program of psychological recovery (cf. pp. 3.10:39-40).