“Gang Pastor”

"Called by God into a life far from his Christian but comfortable existence, Andie Steele-Smith has recently won international acclaim as the “gang pastor” crossing rival lines. Serving the last five years in 2018’s second-highest homicide city, he has led murderers and drug lords to cooperate amid the coronavirus pandemic as a new distribution network for soap and emergency food delivery." Meet the ‘Gang Pastor’ Behind Cape Town’s Viral Coronavirus Cooperation

Read more: Gangs deliver food in poor Cape Town area amid lockdown AP, How coronavirus inspired a gangland truce in South Africa - BBC, "Literally a miracle": Violent rival gangs in South Africa call truce to help people during pandemic - CBS

"The No. 1 lesson is just turn up. You don’t need a project or a program, but if you turn up every day you are no longer just a white person. All of a sudden, you are one of us." 

"So the second lesson is to run into the flames, rather than do the natural thing and run … away from it."

'Six young men from another gang came to attack us with knives drawn. I pulled my boys behind me, and on autopilot I grabbed the leader, hugged him, and kissed him on the forehead. He burst into tears, put his knife in his pocket, and said, “Uncle, can we help build with you?”'

"The things that people see in the media and say are amazing? No, these are the unintended consequences; they’re irrelevant in a sense. That’s not actually what we are there to do. It is to love someone who might not have felt loved."