Mrs Marilyn Hebbron thought her Hampshire village of Four Marks a pleasant place - until youths gathered on the village green each night, bringing noise and "inappropriate sexual behaviour" and leaving behind drug paraphernalia and empty bottles.Having grown tired of verbal abuse and youths vomiting and urinating in her garden, she called neighbours together. Clothed in yellow jackets and supported by local police, they now form regular street patrols.
"Now I have got to know those people I once feared," she says. "Things are not as bad as they seem. It turns out it is just a minority of people going over the top."
Six police forces have visited the area to see her Street Watch scheme in action.
In 2003, a group of local Christians began to patrol the streets of Brixton at weekends. Now there are 125 groups of trained Street Pastors, as they call themselves, serving in their distinctive blue jackets in the streets of towns and cities across Britain - helping youngsters who have drunk too much to get home safely, discouraging antisocial behaviour, defusing potentially violent situations and offering a word of help and comfort where they're able.
"Getting out of the cosy environment of our churches and homes to where we can make a difference," as one put it. According to police, they make a real difference in reducing public disorder in areas where they operate.
Recently the local church I belong to organised some days of prayer and fasting. I was praying for the streets of our towns and cities. They seem to me to be reasonable places during daylight hours - but when darkness falls, it seems like evil takes over. People start using obscene language at the top of their voices; there's violence and drunken belligerence. I want our streets back.
I am asking Christians I know to pray for our streets, so that elderly people can walk them once more without fear, and they can become once again places for decent, righteous, godly behaviour. Would you like to join in?
