Working with those on the margins of your community and with your local police:
some practical advice for churches

To read the related feature Love Thy Neighbourhood please see Issue 3 [January/February 2008] of Faithworks magazine.

 

Working safely and effectively with those on the margins of your community

 

1. Think advance planning

Often the sort of people who turn up at your church who are disruptive or in real need are victims themselves. They will need love and attention. However, often people turn to a church because they expect that the church will be able to sort their problems out immediately. Churches cannot be expected to deal with all the situations that they come across.

 

Action: As a church or organisation, discuss the responses that you will give to those who come to you for help. If someone has a need for housing or finance, for example, will you be able to help him or her? Is your whole team aware of the response that should be given to each sort of request? Have a set protocol that everyone is aware of.

 

2. Prepare for emergencies

If a representative at the church cannot assist the person who has come to you, the situation can take a turn for the worse. Those seeking help can become frustrated and upset and take their anger out on that person.

Discuss how prepared you are for this sort of situation. In an emergency, who should team or church members turn to?

 

Action: Here are some things to bear in mind in developing your contingency plan:

 

 

3. Research local contacts

A solution to this is for churches to have a comprehensive guide of local contacts where they can refer the person to in order to meet their needs. Your partner organisations can provide the professional help that your church cannot.

Also try contacting specialist Christian Ministries e.g. some ex-offender groups and asylum seeker ministries. Churches might also want to consider making a contribution to Local Strategic Partnerships (LSP) and Crime and Disorder Reduction Partnerships (CDRP). Information about these can be found on the Faithworks website and through your local police.
Remember: this is not an excuse not to show people love and to usher them away from the church, but rather a practical way to help meet their needs.

Action: Find out about your local hostel, citizen’s advice bureau, drop-in centre and other local services and agencies. Compile a short but informative guide for members of your church or organisation. Include contact numbers, addresses opening times and directions. Alternatively, produce small laminate cards that can be easily kept in a wallet.

 

4. Research local needs

How well does your church know the needs in your local community? If you are well informed in this area, you will be more effective in delivering helpful advice to those who come to you.

 

Action: Look to your local authority for training and advice in this area. Make contact with your local police service, many of which now have dedicated community teams who will patrol your area on a daily basis as part of the Governments’ Safer Neighborhood Policing Plan. In some areas the police will hold surgeries in the church itself for the community to drop in and ask questions.

 

5. Analyse what you do

How effectively are you using the ‘man power’ both in your church, and in the local area?

 

Action: Consider what gifts and skills you have represented in your church. Do you have a member who works for a local housing authority or a counsellor who could provide some basic training for other members? Consider setting up a mentoring scheme for those who come to the church with needs. Also look for opportunities for joint working initiatives with local agencies – are you partnering with your local police?

 

 

Working effectively with local police

 

Neighborhood Policing is still very much in its infancy. Local partners across all sectors are learning to work together despite many organisational and even cultural differences. Already we are seeing communities benefiting, as more people gain access to police resources and influence over local crime reduction priorities. Working effectively in partnership requires trust and this takes time to build. Here therefore, are a few ‘Do’s’ and ‘Don’ts’ when approaching and working with your local police station, so your church may avoid some of the pitfalls I have seen. Get it right and your church could become a valued stake-holder in a community partnership.

 

Do…

 

1. Do preserve your organisational integrity
Present government thinking dictates that whenever welfare state provision is limited due to resources, local governments can procure alternative sources of social (or faithful) capital from charitable service providers in order to help plug any gaps. Some commentators have rightly warned however, that faith-sector and public sector partnerships can potentially suck churches into delivering government priorities rather than God’s ones. This is certainly a danger in working with the police. Whilst a quid pro quo will exist in any partnership, it must always be held loosely so that your church can free itself at any time. In other words, your church is not there to assist the local Chief Superintendent to meet her crime reduction targets, or help the local Sergeant tick enough boxes to get him promoted. Partnership with the police should improve your churches ability to identify problems and deliver solutions, and not become a trap that gives you access to resources only if your church idolatrously tows the line.

 

2. Do create a ‘come as you are’ culture in your church

A Spirit-filled, non-judgmental community is the finest source of healing and acceptance for troubled people. God’s supernatural community is a unique place of freedom and new life, which neither the Police nor other services can offer. But don’t necessarily expect your local police to fully understand this. Many of the people that might start coming to your church will be those who the police are trying to protect the community from. In preparation for this happening, reflect on how your church will explain the difference between the ‘Kingdom of the world’ and the ‘Kingdom of God’ to the PCs and PCSOs you are working with.

 

3. Do prepare your church for the people who may come

OK, hardest case scenario: a registered sex offender who someone in you church has befriended starts attending on Sundays. His whole neighborhood rightly fears him, he is ostracised by family and former friends. He knows he is still a potential predator of children, but something in your church is different. The love he receives is undeserved. He feels the new warmth of grace and the possibility of change. What do you do? How do you minister to him? How do you protect the young members of your congregation? Can he be reached or should he be rejected? What organizations can help?

 

4. Do prepare your congregation for the failures and violence

Getting your congregations’ theology right here can protect them from a crisis of faith later. I have heard some leaders wrongly preach that God will protect His people from physical harm when they enter the danger zone of our streets. Consequently, when violence is used against Christians (say by a drunk or a drug addict) it can do irreparable damage to their trust in God, as it appears that God has not honored His promise. God does not promise us protection from violence! Look at the violence used against those who followed Jesus in the New Testament and beyond.
Similarly, failure can shake faith when those who show promise of change fall away. I worked with a terribly sad young man recently who many Christians over the months befriended, prayed for, and sacrificially reached out to. Many believed wrongly that if they only had enough faith, everything would work out for him. Sadly, despite early encouragements, he died a rotten death, alone and in pain. It was no individual’s fault, but it left several Christians who had been his friends confused about what beliefs they should hold on to when reaching out in this way.

 

5. Do start praying together!

Some Christian Police Association branch leaders have collated hard data showing large reductions in crime at locations where churches ecumenically commit to praying regularly about local community safety concerns.

 

6. Do contact your local chief inspector

He or she can be found either by calling the local Police Enquiries Centre, or on your Constabularies web site. Also visit the Neighborhood Policing website www.neighbourhoodpolicing.co.uk as this will give you full information on how Policing operates in the England and Wales.
There is no national policy guiding the police relationship with faith groups so different stations will operate in different ways. Remember the police will only work with serious minded and responsible faith-based groups who are well organised and have clear, achievable objectives.

 

7. Do think about what questions will be asked of you

When you do make contact, be prepared that many police supervisors labor under the belief that if they work with one faith group they should be working with all and fear showing favoritism by working with any single denomination or religion. To overcome this you must convince them that you are not against the police having other faith partners, but at the moment you are the ones asking to work with them. You also need to show that what you are asking for is consistent with their statutory commitment to Neighborhood Policing and will make a positive contribution to local community safety. So do your homework!

 

Don’t…

 

1. Don’t exaggerate your success

I recently heard of a speaker who claimed that since street pastors ‘went live’ in his area, the entire city seemed to be a quieter, less violent place. Although his local Street Pastors teams make a fantastic contribution to the ‘night time economy’, the comment undermined the work of hundreds of police officers, and local authority staff who have worked tirelessly for years in the area.
If you want to be taken seriously by the police, be sure to promote realistic goals and successes.

 

2. Don’t take troubled people to your own home

I have met Christians who have put themselves at serious risk from violent and sexual harm by offering their homes to people with needs which they are not equipped to cope with. A warm bed, home cooked meal and pious prayers are not the answer to most troubled people with an addiction or mental health crises. They need long term specialist care alongside what a Christian family can offer. I have come across horror stories ranging from Christians being pushed out of their homes to whole families being murdered in their beds because well meaning Christians had underestimated what they were facing.

 

3. Don’t super-spiritualize every problem

Praying for people at the street level can be an awesome experience. I have been blown away by just how many people desire some sacred space created for them by local Christians outside a night club or places where the homeless gather. These are special moments. But this can be abused if a Christian starts to make vague or inaccurate prophetic utterances, calling down divine healings from heaven which require on the spot results, or making dramatic attempts to cast out demons that are not there. Whilst I personally firmly believe in personified evil, and that God still miraculously heals today, most people require your long-term commitment alongside some form of professional intervention from your multi-agency partners. No police station will support a churches’ work if its members are strutting around the beat like super-apostles offering signs and wonders to needy people rather than deep compassion and long term commitment.

 

4. Don’t treat the police like they do not understand the problems people face as well as you do because you are a Christian

I see this too often. Of course the police do not address spiritual needs and never will, nor do they interpret the problems of the world biblically. Nevertheless that doesn’t mean we know nothing about sexual abuse, domestic violence, or juvenile nuisance etc. In fact we know a great deal as we work on these problems 24/7, year-in, year-out; continually developing our knowledge and improving our responses to them. If you alienate other stakeholders early on with a sloppy attitude towards hard work already being done, you will never get the access to the vital resources you need to become an effective community player yourself. I am not suggesting you do not challenge police policies and procedures; we are after all a publicly accountable organisation. I am however advising you to be discerning if you do.

 

5. Don’t use someone’s problems as a springboard to preach the doctrine of ‘justification by faith alone’ at them

If ministering to needs on earth is simply a smokescreen for our real priority of recruiting more souls to heaven, and bums on our earthly pews, then this will be quickly recognized by other partner agencies. No one will mind you sharing your faith, but, the police will not allow themselves to become vehicles for anyone’s proselytizing campaign and will quite correctly distance themselves from you.

 

6. Don’t ever use language that is sexist, racist or homophobic.

 

By PC Dan Stork-Banks and PC Andy Briers.