Guy Jamieson: To move on from Lee Rigby’s murder we must bridge the gaps where hate grows

I’VE been listening closely to the reactions in our local communities since the murder of Fusilier Lee Rigby in May 2013 which, I believe, will be a long-term reference point for how we address hatred and ignorance in our land.

When you get beyond the immediate outpouring of grief on the one hand, and the futile condemnation on the other, there remain two strands in the public’s response which have been the most apparent. The first has been seen in the minority of people who have tried to bridge cultural gaps in a commendable variety of ways. The second has resembled anaesthetised indifference in the majority. In some cases the latter has been no more than a fragile, see-through mask to a lurking sense of vengeance.

The overall response has been one where cultural disengagement seems to be favoured. But as we think about the sentencing of Lee Rigby’s killers, does this cocktail of indifference and condemnation sentence our communities to shallow and fragile futures?

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In this centenary year of the outbreak of the First World War, it has been observed by the historian Max Hastings that there “is not and never will be a definitive interpretation of the coming of war”. I’m sure he is right, but war begins in ordinary human relations in ordinary communities where we see how an inability to resolve conflicting ideas and ideals repeatedly leads to conflict.

When people are sentenced through the courts, we are all asked to re-assess the use of our own freedom which allows us 
to “sentence ourselves” to one of two futures.

The healthy response, which bears the common good on our hearts, is one which sees us all make particular efforts to minimise ignorance and the stirrings of vengeance by proactive engagement with the issues that can lead to such a tragic deterioration in human behaviour.

This takes courage – not everybody wants to explore human nature or learn about the radically different traditions and cultures of our land, but we can all do something to bridge the gap that currently exists in too many of our communities.

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The other future we can sentence ourselves to is one which allows ignorance to fester and grow; where to knowingly remain disengaged from the issues of the day is to sentence communities to continued, if not increased, exposure to the threat of violence and bloodshed.

This year’s First World War commemorations provide us all with opportunities to re-engage with our communities. It is already showing how history is full of turning points but they can only be recorded as such if we allow ourselves to be turned in the right direction by them. The events have to bring about some kind of change in our communities.

If we let the jailing for life of Lee’s killers Michael Adebolajo, 29, and Michael Adebowale, 22, be our final consideration, we will have missed the point that their sentencing does not simply mean a change of circumstances for them but a call for community-wide change. Judicial sentencing brings to an end the freedom of movement for the guilty, not for its own sake, but to renew awareness of the purpose of our own freedom.

Freedom of movement is a treasured gift of a mature, trustworthy society. It should be safe, in a mature society, to assume that there is sufficient emotional intelligence to respect the difference of people we will encounter from all over the world in our multicultural communities.

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The trustworthiness of a society should be apparent in the way that we can be left to carry out our plans in the knowledge that all actions have consequences for others.

The supposed comforts of isolation can also, unwittingly, bring dangers for us all.

Communities are created to speak to one another, but if a community seeks strength in itself alone, it will become a “compartment” which is enclosed from the wider experience so crucial to our growth and self-understanding.

While it is important that communities cherish their respective identities, they 
remain malnourished for 
as long as they limit the opportunities for living, interactive communication.

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It is understandable why some people in communities feel enfeebled despite, or because of, the enormity of opinion being shared across so many means of communication.

In the late 1980s, the Bradford band New Model Army wrote the lyrics: “This golden age of communication means everybody talks at the same time.”

A quarter of a century later, it is understandable how people can feel submerged by a cascade of communication and then retreat into what is all-too-familiar, denying themselves and their neighbours the nourishment of experience.

The subsequent retreat and disengagement can become an open door to social breakdown, violence and ultimately terrorism. Ugly consequences will never be far away for as long as ignorance remains acceptable.

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Active neighbourly concern has, in many places, retreated under a cloud of doubt as to its purpose. It is frequently dismissed as being ideological or outside the realms of necessity; as something excessive, questionable or even suspicious. What should be simple and everyday is now seen as radical, and the word “radical” has been re-appropriated to become almost synonymous with religious terrorism.

Originally used to describe an attempt to get to the roots of an idea or way of life, it simply means a sincere attempt to live out a conviction more authentically.

With so much talk this year about warfare and its causes, it is time for ordinary people to reclaim the language of radical action and live out its meaning.

Our challenge in the current era is to inhabit something of another culture’s world in order to make life healthier for us all.

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The social health of local, outlying districts and communities is dependent, to a degree, on their relationship with surrounding communities.

We under-estimate how seriously we impoverish ourselves and others by keeping our distance. Knowledge of our neighbour is a simple, stimulating action and its fruits for local life are boundless.

Father Guy Jamieson is a vicar for the parishes of St Anne’s and St Thomas’s in Halifax. He had presided over Lee Rigby’s wedding.