J. ERIC GOUGH, is a West Australian and graduated from the College of the Bible, Glen Iris, in 1952. He has served the Church at Claremont (W.A.) in a full-time capacity and while pursuing further studies has undertaken part-time ministries at a number of West Australian churches.

      If Christians should be convinced of one thing above all others it would be that the gospel is relevant to the lives of men and women today. If ever it could be shown that the Christian message makes no difference to life here and now the Church would have to shut its doors. This is why the Church concerns itself with the problems of people both as individuals and in community. Recognising that some problems go beyond the individual to the wider society the Church attacks those social evils that degrade and destroy men. As a result we are well aware of what the Church has to say about drinking and gambling, the treatment of the aborigines, war and peace, and even the Christian and politics. The Church is right to be concerned with such things because the message of Christ lays upon us the burden of concern for the woes of men and, also because it provides us with principles which, if put into practice, will put an end to these maladies. Yet there is one social problem about which the Church seems so far to have said and done little--the problem of juvenile delinquency.

      There can be little question that juvenile delinquency is generally regarded as a modern development a product of our own century in fact, and a sure sign that the youth of today are not what their parents were. It is interesting to find that an Egyptian priest carved these words on the wall of a tomb nearly 6,000 years ago,

      "Our earth is degenerate in these latter days. There are signs that the world is coming to an end because children no longer obey their parents."

      Several thousand years later but still some few hundred years before the time of Christ, Socrates said,

      "Children now love luxury, they have bad manners, contempt for authority, they show disrespect for elders, and love chatter in place of exercise. Children no longer rise when elders enter the room. They contradict their parents, chatter before company, gobble up dainties at the table, cross their legs, and tyrannise their teachers."

      Young people may take comfort in the fact that the younger generation has always been a source of dismay to its elders. It would seem that we may have some grounds for wondering whether the problem of juvenile delinquency is quite as modern as we think. However interesting such speculation may be is more to the point to ask ourselves what we mean by delinquency.

      Delinquency may be looked at from a number of points of view. From the legal point of view delinquency consists of "acts of a kind which, when committed by persons beyond the statutory juvenile court age . . . are punishable as crimes."

      In general then the legal point of view is that delinquency depends, on the breaking of the law and it is only the age of the offender that causes him to be treated any differently from adult criminals. The point of view of the sociologist is quite different. For him delinquent behaviour may or may not be illegal but it is always anti-social. This means that the delinquent is antagonistic to the organised society in which he lives and refuses to accept its values, standards and norms and his delinquent behaviour is an expression of his antagonism.

      Yet another viewpoint is provided by the psychologist who considers delinquency to be an indicator of personality mal-adjustment. Some have even gone so far as to draw an analogy between the mental defective and the delinquent. They would say that just as the mental defective is unable to organise his material environment into right relationship with himself so the delinquent is unable to organise his moral environment into right relationship with himself. In other words he never succeeds in fitting truth, kindness, sympathy and integrity into the total pattern of his life and thinking,

      The importance of modern emphasis could be summed up by saying that nowadays we are more concerned with the delinquent than with his delinquency. The factors that produce the behaviour are more important than the behaviour itself. Or to put it another way delinquency is not a "disease" that afflicts the "body of society" just as cancer afflicts the physical body. Instead it is like a fever which is symptomatic of something wrong underneath. The good physician treats not only the fever but the underlying causes.

      We would define delinquency as referring to acts of an anti-social nature, which are repeated in such a way as to become an accepted response for the individual and which are symptomatic of underlying in mal-adjustment and personality defects. In Western Australia approximately a thousand young people are labelled as delinquent every year. Perhaps this would not make us greatly concerned if it were not recognised that for various reasons a much larger number of delinquents never appear before the court. If the real figures for our State were translated into figures for the Commonwealth we would be able to appreciate the cost of this problem to the community in terms of money and to a great many individuals in terms of unhappiness. This is surely good enough reason why the Church should concern itself with juvenile

delinquency. In this paper I wish to summarise what is known at present of the causes of delinquency and to suggest that neither society nor the Church has so far made any substantial contribution to its prevention. I cannot hope that this approach will be popular but if it provides information and provokes thought it will have served its purpose.

      It is interesting to notice that delinquency rates appear to show a relationship, to certain socio-economic trends. Two of these are worth looking at. In times of prosperity and an expanding economy juvenile delinquency rates rise. In times of depression or recession they fall. How universally true this is may be questioned but the interesting thing about it is that the very reverse is true of adult criminality. In times of prosperity adult criminality is reduced and in times of adversity it is increased.

      The suggested explanation of this is that in prosperous times the family unit tends to become "disorganised." Money is available for outside pleasures, both parents may be working, and generally parental supervision is reduced. Hence delinquency rates rise. In bad times he family becomes more closely integrated and its members more dependent upon each other and parental supervision increases with a consequent lowering of delinquency rates. For adults it is bad times with consequent idleness, poverty and dissatisfaction that causes an increase in the adult crime rate. It is difficult to confirm the existence of such trends due to the presence of many other factors but the possibility is interesting.

      A second relationship occurs between delinquency and war and peace. In wartime the juvenile rates increase and decrease in peace time. Once again the reverse holds for adults. The explanation would seem to be essentially similar inasmuch as war time is usually associated with reduced parental supervision plus the fact that adolescents, being too young for the services, feel cheated of the "excitement and glamour" of being in the forces, and seek adventure in other ways. If such relationships do exist in fact then one important consequence is that we must use extreme caution in using changes in the incidence of delinquency to prove either the adequacy or inadequacy of our attempts to deal with the problem.

      Before discussing the causes of delinquency it is necessary to point out something that is not generally recognised by any but specialists in the field and sometimes not by them.

      All the research that has so far been carried out has failed to isolate any factor which can be pointed to as the cause of delinquency. The best that has been done is to demonstrate relationships. For example there is a relationship between delinquency and broken homes (homes in which parents are separated or divorced). This means that in a group of delinquents more of them would come from broken homes than would be the case in a comparable group of non-delinquents. But this relationship is not absolute. In other words while some delinquents will come from broken homes many will come from unbroken homes. In addition there will be many non-delinquents who come from unbroken homes but there will also be some non-delinquents whose homes are broken. Under these circumstances it cannot be said in any general sense that broken homes cause delinquency. It is more likely that each case of delinquency is the product of a great many factors and much remains to be done in investigating their nature and relationships.

      These causative factors can be divided into three groups.

      A centre circle represents the individual youth or personality. The second circle represents the influences which come from within the family circle. The third circle presents those factors coming from outside the family unit. The contention of the present writer is that delinquency is a result of the forces within all three of these areas and that an understanding of all of them is required.

      Starting with the inner circle first we have the individual personality. Sheldon and Eleanor Glueck in one of the largest and most painstaking investigations ever conducted had a group of 500 delinquents matched with an equal umber of non-delinquents of approximately the same age, education, race, socio-economic background and intelligence. They claimed that the delinquent individual differed from the non-delinquent in four ways. Firstly, in physique, the delinquents being more solid, closely knit and muscular. Secondly, in temperament, the delinquents being restlessly energetic, impulsive, extroverted, aggressive and destructive. Thirdly, in attitudes, the delinquents being hostile, defiant, resentful, suspicious, stubborn, socially assertive, adventurous, unconventional, and unwilling to submit to authority. Fourthly, delinquents differ psychologically in tending to be direct and concrete in intellectual expression rather than symbolic, and in being less methodical in their approach to problems.

      Other studies of a similar nature could be quoted and the results of such studies would give us a list of personality traits claimed to differentiate between delinquents and non-delinquents. Unfortunately two investigators summarised all

the findings of more than a hundred of these studies and found that there was no agreement on even one personality trait which would distinguish between delinquents and non-delinquents. This means of course, that we are forced to recognise that delinquency depends not only on the kind of personality you have, but on the social situations in which you function.

      Taking now our second circle we must examine the part played by the family in delinquency. In their study the Gluecks made the following point: "If the child's family life were adequate the chances were only 3 in 100 that he would turn out to be delinquent, but if his family situation were poor the chances were 98 in 100 that he would become delinquent." Such predictions must be taken with a grain of salt because it depends how you define "adequate" on the one hand and "poor" on the other. However, Healy and Bronner supported this finding when they viewed family life from three angles. (1) Reasonably good home conditions from the standpoint of stability, living conditions, and normal recreational opportunities. (2) Reasonably good attitudes on the part of the family with regard to avoidance of friction, rational treatment of children, and being law abiding. (3) The home being situated in a neighbourhood not distinctly bad from the point of view of inimical influences. They found that out of 133 homes only 22 had fair conditions in each of the three categories. A further 19 had fair conditions in two categories. So that, while on the one hand we must avoid making the family the scapegoat for juvenile delinquency, we have good ground for believing that it exercises considerable influence.

      This is further demonstrated when we consider the influence of broken homes on delinquency. At one time it was considered that a broken home was a prime factor in causing delinquency. A study by two investigators does not bear this out. However, these writers did point out that a broken home does have ill effects but that these are more noticeable if it occur when the children are young. In addition they showed that it was not the formal break that mattered so much, as the strife and disharmony leading up to the separation.

      The size of the family and one's position in it seem to make some difference. It can be generally shown that children in larger families tend to become delinquent more frequently (proportionately) than children from small families. One investigator found that subtle differences existed. For example, delinquency rates were higher for girls whose siblings were all brothers than for girls whose siblings were all sisters. Generally delinquency rates were higher for children who had only younger brothers and sisters than for children who had older brothers and sisters. Whether these facts are significant in themselves or not it is difficult to say. Perhaps they point to the operation of more basic factors still.

      Family poverty is another popularly conceived cause. By and large juvenile delinquency appears to be a working class phenomena, although this is less true today than it used to be. It is doubtful, however, if it is a direct function of poverty. Sir Cyril Burt estimated that in only 3 per cent of the cases that he studied did poverty play an appreciable part. Poverty is not an easy concept to deal with for it does not always depend on the income of a family so much as the way that income is spent. Thus "secondary" poverty may be a much more important factor than is realised, that is, those cases in which the family income is spent on non-essentials--gambling,

drinking, social activities leaving insufficient finance for the necessities of acceptable living.

      Affection and discipline are further factors to be considered.

      Parents are expected to be the primary agents for both affection and discipline.

      These contradictory roles are often pointed to as creative of family tension. "Good" discipline may be regarded as control that is firm but not so strict as to cause fear; "fair" discipline is sometimes inconsistent, but generally moderately firm; "poor" discipline is very lax, or extremely rigid, or very erratic. Affection is described as "good" if it involves a parental relationship that is sympathetic and kind; "fair" affection is some what indifferent; "poor" affection involves a clearly hostile attitude by the parents. Merrill found that the main difference between a delinquent group and a non-delinquent group was the poor discipline in the former and the greater degree of hostility on the part of the parents. Thus it can be seen that the family may lay the foundations for good personality development and adjustment or it can sow the seeds of later rebellion.

      Finally, under causes we look at the outer circle of the socio-cultural environment. Within the limits of this discussion we cannot deal with all the factors operating in the social and cultural environment of the delinquent. One of the most important aspects of this area is what we call the peer group. In the technical sense a peer is a person whom one meets on terms of approximate equality. For the child, a peer is another child of similar age, often of the same sex, with whom he can associate on roughly equal terms. No matter how adequate the family life of a child may be it cannot (and should not) isolate him from the influence of the peer group. This is the case even though the values of the peer group differ from those of the family, being considered by the family as less desirable.

      The juvenile peer group is very effective in producing conformity. The individual is more concerned to win the approval of this group than of most others. The family may decide what clothes the child should wear but whether such clothes are satisfactory to the child will be determined by the reaction of his peer group. So it follows that if any particular peer group is subject to bad influences, and develops delinquent tendencies, it tends to corrupt all who value a place in it. And the reason why the peer group is important is that it often provides the main social medium for satisfying the juvenile's wishes for security, recognition, and new experience. In the case of new experience this may take the form of games and athletics, the use of liquor or drugs, or gambling and predatory exploits. As a general rule the less rewarding and the more drab a child's life outside the group, the more value he places on winning a position in the group. In view of these facts it is not surprising that studies in delinquency show that the greater number of offences is committed in groups or sub-groups.

      This more or less completes the discussion of causes. It will be evident to the reader that we have not come a great deal nearer to solving the problem. For that reason we may well consider what Milton Barron calls "The Delinquent Society." In explaining what is meant by this term we become less scientific and more impressionistic but for all that the concept is a provocative one. Delinquents are not produced in a vacuum. They grow up in a society. It is our society that has produced delinquency. This is not a complete negation of personal responsibility. It is simply to say that "society plays an incredibly greater role in

making individual juvenile delinquents than the individual freely determines for himself." How can this be so? The most important aspect of society is its value system. A value system consists of those symbols which are regarded by the members of society as valuable in terms of their truth or worthwhileness. Because they are valuable and meaningful they are accepted and built into the educational processes of the family, the school and other agencies by which society seeks to perpetuate itself. These values may be either explicit or implicit, The explicit values are those that society officially espouses. The implicit values are those which are not officially adopted but which never the less motivate much of the behaviour of society. The child is exposed to these implicit values as he observes the daily behaviour and casual conversation of his parents and other adults. The child detects them and incorporates them even though they may conflict with the official values which he is taught. The implication in the concept "delinquent society" is that many of these implicit values lead to delinquency. To illustrate this consider some of the implicit values that underlie our society.

      Success has become a god. We evaluate people not in terms of the worth of their contribution to the community but in terms of their success. Until the recent boom period enriched the country districts, city folks were prone to look with condescension upon their country cousins. Today the situation is somewhat reversed for the country cousins have won economic success. Passing exams, getting promoted, rising above the level of one's parents, are all used as indicators of success. As a result of this emphasis success becomes worth claiming even when it has not been achieved. Much of what we see around us is simply a facade. Living in houses we will never pay for. Buying motor cars we cannot afford. Banqueting on the credit allowed us by the butcher and baker. And all because it is not enough to keep up with the Jones' today, we only succeed when we surpass them, How does this lead to delinquency? There are many young people who feel the stigma of failure. They may not be academically bright and so cannot achieve success in the schoolroom. They may not be good at sport and so cannot achieve success on the playing field. They may be unwanted or neglected at home and so feel unable to achieve success in personal relationships. As a result they find in delinquency a field where they can succeed. Where disregard for others, daredevilry, viciousness, brushes with the police are stepping stones to success and in company with delinquents they find what has been denied them in the wider society. You and I may find it difficult to conceive how such things could ever spell success but to some juvenile delinquents there is no doubt that they do.

      Power is another value upon which society implicitly sets a premium. The desire to be one's own boss or to be able to control the lives and destinies of others is common to many people. The quest for bigger and better atomic weapons, the exploitation of negro or aborigine, the myth of masculine superiority all reflect this urge to power. Money, education, political influence, social status are some of the means by which power may be obtained. But what if you possess none of these? Then in socially acceptable ways you will find it hard to satisfy your desire for power. But there are other courses open, and one of these is chosen by the delinquent. He attacks society. He expresses his desire for power by disregarding the laws of the land and even the laws of common decency. He flaunts his power in the face of society and officialdom which can find no solution to the

problems posed by him and his delinquents.

      Novelty is a third implicit value belonging to our society. Women like to achieve it by wearing models that are supposedly unique. Home plans often find a ready market because they are both contemporary and different. Cinemas attract patrons by advertising their new "cinemascope, stereoscopic, technicoloured screening of the never before seen, absolutely undreamed of, centuries ahead of its time, latest production of Hollywood. The upper crust of America's fashion world was horrified recently because a recent distinguished visitor to the United States wore the same dress on two consecutive days. Something new and different is what everyone is looking for. And the delinquent is no different. He has tried Luna Park, Boys' club, Sunday school, the circus, everything. But there are thrills that can still be experienced. Stealing a motor car for a joy ride, breaking and entering, or destroying public property. This craze for novelty is a built-in encouragement toward delinquency.

      All this adds up to sheer materialism. This is the fundamental error of our society. The rights of men, obedience to parents personal integrity are all values which are officially espoused. But the values which men pursue and society rewards are often not these but the values of materialism acquiring, succeeding, outdoing. No wonder delinquents are insensitive to the feelings of others. No wonder they can see nothing wrong in achieving these implicit values the best way they can. When you ask what can be done surely the answer is plain. We must see the damage that is being done by this divorce between implicit and explicit values. We must build into the structure of society values, which when lived out in the lives of its members will prevent the development of the delinquent personality and which will enable every individual to earn a full measure of achievement and satisfaction.

      What is the role played by the Church in this problem? In a particular sense the part played by the Church differs from place to place. In Victoria it is clergymen who are commonly appointed as probation officers. In Western Australia the Church has no obvious or prescribed function as far as delinquency is concerned. There are reasons for such variation but it is unfortunate, for if delinquency is a problem produced by society as a whole then it will be dealt with successfully only by the whole of society. The Church has a part to play and should be encouraged to fit herself for that part. But in a more general sense is it possible to see what the Church has to contribute? There is a facile answer. That is to say--look! the Church has the answer. It preaches the only way of life that can save us from delinquency. When the delinquent comes to the Church and finds Christ the problem will be solved. This is true, but the Church has never stopped preaching and delinquency is an ever increasing problem. Is the Church making any impact at all on the type of person who tends to become delinquent? Rather than argue this question it may be more useful to look at the findings of some studies which have attempted to answer the question.

      For example, Dr. Mursell found that inmates of a reform school had received fully as much religious training as had the children outside. Professor Hightower after testing 3,000 children declared "there appears to be no relationship of any consequence between Biblical information and the different phases of conduct studied. It indicates that mere knowledge of the Bible is not in itself sufficient to insure proper character growth." Another investigator studied 761 delinquent children in New Jersey.

      All but 7 per cent were connected with some Church. Two thirds were members of the Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox Churches. Of the whole group 54 per cent attended Church regularly. 20 per cent attended occasionally. The remainder rarely went to any Church. Middleton and Fay studied 83 delinquent and 100 non-delinquent girls. They found that the attitude of delinquent girls is more favourable to Sunday observance and the Bible than that of non-delinquent girls. These studies are fairly typical although perhaps a word of caution is needed. It is possible that some of the studies suffer from methodological weaknesses which would invalidate their findings. It is possible that many of the investigators were not very successful in measuring the "Church" factor. Many of these studies use Church affiliation or attendance as criteria--but we know all too well that neither of these by themselves are sound indicators of spiritual depth, It is further possible that some studies have been carried out by investigators who were not kindly disposed toward the Church. Scientific literature is not without examples of investigators who desired a certain result actually finding what they wanted.

      Suppose however, that we accepted the findings of such studies as valid, what then? Surely this should be a spur to a careful survey of what the Church is trying to do and how effective it is. Quite recently a study reported that children who did not go to Sunday school scored 30 per cent on a simple Bible knowledge quiz. Protestant Sunday school scholars scored 35 per cent and Roman Catholics children who were receiving regular instruction scored 46 per cent.. A famous investigation by Hartshorne and May came to the conclusion that children who go to Sunday school are not more honest than those who don't. Another interesting study sought to measure the relationship between children's attitudes and the attitudes of those around them. As you would expect the closest correspondence in attitudes is between children and parents. Next comes friends, then club leaders, then day, school teachers and last of all Sunday school teachers. It would appear then that we must seriously question the effectiveness of our teaching. Most Churches are well aware of the need for constant revision and self criticism. Our own Federal Board of Christian Education has a commendable and far sighted policy on this matter as far as providing lesson materials is concerned. Again in defence of the Church it should be pointed out that there is often difficulty in securing qualified teachers. Training of Sunday school teachers is something that is often done poorly or not at all. Conditions for teaching with lack of space and equipment, militate against effective teaching. In addition it is only fair to point out that what we are seeking to do through our Sunday schools is not simply to impart facts but to win the allegiance of scholars to a total way of life and this is always harder to do than to communicate straight facts.

      Possibly an even more disconcerting thought is that no matter how hard we work in the Sunday school this will not make the teaching of the Church any more effective because of basic weaknesses in the Church itself. Is it possible for example, that the Church has taken over many of the implicit values of society? Is it true that the Church tends to worship success power, novelty? Is it true that the Church has a widespread materialistic bias--and that in the rebellion of the delinquent against society he does not heed the Church because she suffers from the same sins as the wider community? It certainly appears that the average Church congregation is

composed largely of what we might call "middle class" people. Many own their own homes which are furnished with the common comforts and labour saving devices. Many have a car. Some own beach cottages. Their children often go on to University or other high level education. The Church certainly gets on better in the substantial middle class districts than it usually does in the poorer areas. So it would seem that the very inability of the Church to work effectively in the poorer areas is one very obvious reason why it contributes so little to the problem of delinquency. There is a deeper reason however. It is that the Church has taken over some of the implicit values of society and that our witness has thereby been weakened. This is not an idle attack on the Church. It is easy to point at other people or other institutions and say that this one or that one is to blame for delinquency. It is too easy--and it isn't true. The Church is only a part of society--but if society is responsible then the Church must bear part of that responsibility. We must find a way of making contact. We must find ways of making the gospel relevant. We must show our concern for the problems of the community--not merely standing by to deplore them, but actively co-operating to remedy them.

      To conclude I would like to suggest some broad remedies that the Church must be prepared to adopt if it wishes to make a worthwhile contribution to the solution of this particular problem or of any of the other social evils of our day. This is not intended to be a specific programme for the Church but rather to provide a point of departure.

      Firstly, the Church must stop dealing with trivialities. It is unfortunate that in some Churches you still hear earnest discussions as to whether girls should wear make-up or whether young people should go to the cinema. These topics are trivial when you consider the tremendous issues with which our world is faced. The starving millions of the over populated countries of the world, the state of international tension the social evils that are destroying our western civilization. If the Church is to be listened to it must deal with the great issues of life and not with trivialities. If the Church is to make its message relevant, to the needs of young people it must understand the problems that perplex them. Too often our concern with trivialities is a cloak for our inability to grapple with the deep things of life. When the Church shows that it is conscious of the difficulties that loom large to the teenager--that it is ready to spend itself in finding an answer to these difficulties--and that it is, in fact, dealing with the great and fundamental issues of life, then its voice will be heeded by society at large and youth in particular.

      Secondly, the Church must speak with a united voice. While the Church is divided it will have little strength to deal with the social issues and pressures that confront, it. In the United States we have a most amazing paradox. The Church has never been stronger in terms of membership and money than it is at the present time. Yet the social problems that beset that country have reached colossal dimensions. The steadily rising Church statistics have been paralleled by increasing criminal and delinquency rates, by rising divorce rates, and by tragic increases in drug trafficking. I believe that the power of the gospel is so negated by a divided Church that, it has little impact on the wider community. Hopeful as recent ecumenical moves have been it is still evident that many churches are mainly concerned with "pushing their own barrow." Perhaps it would be melodramatic to suggest

that the words of Jesus be applied to the ecumenical scene. The Church that seeks to save her life will lose it. The Church that loses her life shall save it. We need a readiness on the part of the denominations to sacrifice themselves. Until the Church can pool its resources, preach a common ethic, and demonstrate within its own life the power of the gospel it will remain without influence.

      Thirdly, the Church must be prepared to serve the community. Many of the activities of the Church are undertaken primarily for its own benefit. The bulk of the Church's income is used to maintain itself. The auxiliaries it runs are only run when they will provide new contacts for evangelisation or at least help to hold those who have been evangelised. There is some justification for this. It is only as the Church maintains and even increases its strength that it will be able to render service to others. But unless it can reach beyond the stage where it is primarily concerned with its own survival the service it renders will be negligible. In other words we should be prepared to run some of our auxiliaries not with the object of providing a recruiting ground for Church members but with the object of helping society to provide facilities for dealing with some of its more difficult members.

      Fourthly, the Church must be ready to study the problems with which it wants to deal. This point is not peculiar to the Church, neither for that matter are the other points that have been raised. If the Church wishes to be accepted as a competent body by other institutions and authorities it must take pains to accumulate knowledge and to make every effort to understand the complexity of the issues that confront us. Too often the Church makes foolish and facile comments about how to deal with this problem or that difficulty. Too often it speaks in ignorance of the full facts. Too often it simply speaks to salve its own conscience and without any real concern for doing good. With this particular problem of delinquency one of the things that is urgently needed is a co-ordinating agency which could co-ordinate the activities of all those who wish to make some contribution. In this way information could be shared, co-operative enterprises could be undertaken, and the energies of the community directed into the most profitable channels.

      The Church could take a lead in seeking to establish such an agency but before it does it must gain competence in the field.

      Finally, the Church should be true to its calling. This point has already been covered in the discussion of the Church taking over the implicit values of society. Too often the Church allows "the world to squeeze it into its own mould." As members of the Church we must demonstrate in our own lives and in the lives of our congregations the principles and precepts of our Master. These five points by no means exhaust the subject but they provide a starting point for thought and action. When we start to move then the further steps we must take will become clear to us. But at least, let us start.