Joy Farrington dreams of peace coming to violent neighbourhoods

Joy Attmore

Two days ago I posted a video on my Facebook wall that a good friend of mine had produced about peace in the UK. It brilliantly shows the good news of the reduction in violence displayed across the UK in the last 30 years. Last week, the Guardian newspaper also produced an article on this same subject; crime is at its lowest level in the UK for 30 years. This is something to shout about and celebrate!

Only a couple of hours after sharing my friend's video on Facebook, there was a knock on our front door revealing two policemen in the middle of a neighbourhood enquiry.

"Did you see or hear any commotion going on outside your house around 4pm today?" The questions came as my mum spoke to the officers.

I could hear the concern and anxiety in my mum's voice as she answered the police. We hadn't arrived home from work until about 5:30pm so any street activity before then we had not been aware of. My younger brother sat with me as we listened to the exchange in the hallway, he then admitted to having seen some of the outside disturbance.

It turned out that a man had been violently attacked by a group of men just outside our house. My brother had seen one man carrying a baseball bat and had heard angry exchanges from the group in the street. The police cordoned off the area outside our home and the property next door and kept a presence on the road over night and into the following morning. Although there were eye witnesses to the attack that took place no-one was actually willing to stand up and accuse; even the poor victim didn't want to press charges. This is the effect of fear on a neighbourhood. Fear would rather you sit down and close your eyes than stand up and speak out the truth.

The presence of violence in the UK has reduced, but it hasn't completely disappeared. In some places it is still very much present. I want to see it eliminated completely! I want to see shalom reigning in my neighbourhood and not fear!

Behind every act or word of violence is fear; it is the force that keeps this ball rolling. It's what keeps the witnesses bound and gives power to the perpetrator. It is the real weapon of violence and its reign can affect whole nations.

I've tried living in fear before and it gets old really fast. The problem is fear is also addictive, once you give your life over to it you then become afraid to change it!

Existing in a state of peace, shalom, is a much more powerful way to live; exchanging our rules of fear for ones that are written by the hand of shalom can open up doors that we could only ever dream of beforehand.

Shalom means complete peace. It is a feeling of contentment, completeness, wholeness, well being and harmony. Being peaceful doesn't mean you have to wear rainbow coloured trousers, dance around barefoot and live in a tree for the rest of your life. Knowing peace and living in shalom means surrendering your fears to the Way of Peace; to dare greatly and be vulnerable with someone close to you about what fear is eating you up and to stand up for truth even if the consequences seem quite daunting.

Peace isn't passive, it is active, it is a doing word.

The guys in my road who carried out this attack are scary people, I'm the first to admit that, but they don't know what peace is. No-one has been able to show them yet the true beauty and power of shalom. Imagine if that happened....