Troubled Aussie
youths find friend in ‘Fighting Father Dave’
The Billings Gazette, March
7 2009
It seems like a paradox: teach
unruly youths how to box to dissuade them from pursuing a life of
violence. But an Anglican priest from Australia swears that it works.
The Rev. Dave Smith serves as the
priest at Holy Trinity
Anglican Church, a 100-member parish in Dul wich Hill,
about 5.5 miles southwest of metropolitan Sydney. A big part of his
min istry has to do with working with the toughest of the tough teens
there.
It’s a rough area,
the 47-year-old pugilistic preacher said, one that lots of people avoid.
"I grew up near there, and we
were terrified to go in the area", he said, sitting at a
table inside Doug Pyeatt’s house in Laurel. Smith was dressed in his
Anglican collar, a silver cross draped around his neck, and his hair a
bit mussed.
I came to talk with him at the
invitation of Pyeatt, who himself is a martial-arts prac titioner and
boxer involved in a local boxing ministry. Pyeatt, who works in federal
law enforcement, found out about Smith’s work online and the two struck
up a friendship a couple of years ago.
When Smith traveled to the United
States for a fundraising seminar in San Francisco, he decided to travel
by car to visit some of his American supporters, includ ing Pyeatt.
Traveling west to east, his plan was to finish up his journey in
Washington, D.C., and then hop on a jet back to Australia. Smith
concedes that he turned into a punk growing up, drinking, doing drugs
and generally acting “violent
and nasty"
But he converted to Chris tianity
at age 18 and said he felt called to the ministry.
“My father, who’s a very godly
man, told me he’d been praying for me every day of my life,”
Smith said.
Smith tried praying him self,
telling God that if he could do a better job with Smith’s life, he was
welcome to it.
“I woke up and felt less angry"
Smith said. “I stopped
carrying a knife or chains and I joined a church!"
Smith started out
learning martial arts. He gradually found his interest was drawn to
kick boxing, wrestling and especially boxing.
Boxing, he told me, left no room
for hiding.
“In the ring it’s just my body
and his body" he said. “It’s just honest. It’s very raw
and real, and if done properly, it can be very positive!"
Eventually, Smith earned an
undergraduate degree in philosophy and then he went on to seminary and
was ordained an Anglican priest in 1989. He was sent to Dulwich Hill in
late 1990, basically to close the parish there.
The church had only 30 members
with only two under age 70. The old church building was condemned.
Smith suggested that if the
dwindling congregation wanted to reach out to young people, they’d have
to be will ing to invest in a more modern building with a kitchen where
kids could hang out.
With the congregation’s blessing,
a modest youth cen ter was built. These days, it draws 50-plus kids
every day, and a fight club keeps them occupied every night.
“Fighting is like a magnet for
kids with problems, boys particularly,” Smith said, "although girls come and box to
get fit."
The ratio of boys to girls who
carry out assaults, drug overdoses and suicides is 4 to 1, Smith said.
Of the kids who come, 10 percent choose martial arts and the rest put
on boxing gloves.
"Boys come to box because
they’re angry and they want to prove something." Smith,
who gained the title 'Fighting
Father Dave’ said that boys who are into violence
generally lack confidence and set out to prove they’re tough to gain
prestige.
Interestingly, Smith said, a boy
who steps into the ring angry doesn’t necessary end up on top.
“They find out
very quick ly if they lose control, they can’t win" he
said.
"They also can’t win if they
smoke and drink and do drugs. Not every teen that comes to box
succeeds, he said, but the ones willing to learn discipline - the
biggest key," Smith said "- have the best chance to win
in the ring and in life."
Often the boys drawn to the sport
have been victims of abusive authority. At the fight club, they learn
that Smith and the other mentors have the ability to beat them in the
ring but choose not to. “You
build this relation ship with trust that I think can take social
workers years to build,” he said. "It’s not all positive",
Smith said. He’s buried a lot of kids in the past 20 years, he said,
who have been hooked on heroin or methamphetamine.
The real fight, he said, isn’t at
the church or even in the boxing ring.
“It’s out there, to remain
faithful to partner to do the job to make a contribution to the
community,” Smith said. “Ring fighting helps to
har ness the energy and channel it!’
The Billings
Gazette
March 7th,
2009 |
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| Click here or the pic to see a scanned
graphic of the original article |
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