THE Lae metropolitan police superintendent should be commended for regularly releasing the crime statistics in that city.
This indicates awareness on the part of the Lae police of the need for transparent crime figures to be shared with the community in which the crimes occur.
The most recent figures showed that suspects believed associated with two thirds of the crimes recorded were arrested; that indicates a competent performance on the part of the police force.
But the figures released indicate a deplorable level of crime in Lae and mirror the crime levels that have caused such concern in Mt Hagen in recent weeks.
In a little over three weeks during October, 96 serious crimes were recorded. No less than 26 armed robberies, 11 rapes and 13 break and enter were noted in the same period.
The Lae superintendent has gone to some lengths to compare figures with those recorded in both other months and other years. But there is little comfort to be drawn from the figures.
For while some of the released crime statistics demonstrate a decline in frequency, others remain static or have increased, some markedly.
Yet it is wrong to continually target the RPNG Constabulary and to blame the police force for the number and seriousness of the crimes committed.
Much of the responsibility lies with the community and with community-based organisations.
Christianity is long established in PNG. All the long-standing denominations have made remarkable contributions to the progress of this country.
They have done so first by spreading the word of God; establishing and maintaining schools, training institutions, hospitals and clinics and committing the lives of countless unsung mission workers to the creation of an upright and honourable PNG.
The Christian network in this country has been used extensively by governments, both before and after independence.
Without that major input, the work of both the territorial and independent administrations would have been very much more difficult.
But what of the impact of Christianity upon the lives of ordinary Papua New Guineans?
Most of us when asked describe ourselves as “Christians.”
The more devout in our midst will go further and label their beliefs as “Catholic” or “Lutheran” or “Anglican” or any one of a dozen other high profile denominations.
All Christianity is based on faith and on belief in one Almighty God.
In practice, the religion offers guidelines for our lives, a blueprint intended to help us to come as close as possible to a defined but unachievable perfection.
The gulf between that struggle to approach perfection and the reality of many of our people’s lives yawns at our feet.
Many of us, perhaps even the majority, has adopted the label of Christianity, but not the substance.
Criminals not infrequently wear a crucifix around their necks. Is that a sign of devout Christianity or a 21st century charm against bad luck?
The personal and family impact of Christianity in PNG is becoming more superficial, more generalised and less related to the faith and framework of the past.
That decline in influence and the dilution of the Christian message is travelling in tandem with a sharp rise in the pre-eminence of the material, the secular, the worldly.
And the criminal.
The churches have a fight on their hands.
Many preachers have lost the power of the pulpit, that is to say the clear and unequivocal message and spiritual authority that was once their hallmark.
Many of our young and all those who are swayed by a world in which possessions, self-satisfaction, the lust for power and control and plain old-fashioned greed have become pre-eminent, no longer receive guidance from our churches.
Churches were once the epicentre of activity.
Everything that affected a community, both the good and the bad, came under the influence of the church.
Today, that influence is dissipated, and the young grow up devoid of the spiritual and moral and ethical frameworks familiar to many of our parents.
The church networks still exist.
There is a growing urge to bring denominations closer together.
And the influence of the church to create a harmonious and upright society has never been more sorely needed.