This might come as a surprise, Vanessa, but 72% of people still do it. Make resolutions, that is! So there must be something in it. So in week two of 2012, our Pause For Thoughts will be about RESOLVE and our good intentions for the year.

My resolution should probably be never to do DIY again! Just before Christmas, we got burgled at home, so I decided to fix a bolt to our back gate. With every blow of the hammer, I was thinking about what I’d like to do to the thieves who'd caused us so much upset. It was … therapeutic! But if I’d concentrated more on the task in hand, perhaps I wouldn’t have ended up in A & E on Christmas Day with a metal splinter in my thumb. The nurses were far more forgiving at my disturbing their quiet morning, than I was towards my intruders! Yes, I know I’m supposed to be a peacemaker like Jesus, but when people invade your space and take your stuff, there’s something that makes your hackles rise. Perhaps I need to put a bolt on the backdoor to my emotions – something to stop others invading and stealing my good nature away. I’m sure it’s the sort of anger I was feeling that, if not controlled, can lead to fighting and even war.

It was 66 years ago tomorrow, on10th January 1946, that the first United Nations General Assembly took place at my church, Methodist Central Hall, Westminster. Just after the Second World War, people from 51 nations met and agreed ‘to practice tolerance’ and ‘live together in peace with one another as good neighbours.’ At the time, radio announcers called this resolve to keep the peace, ‘an occasion of unparalleled importance’. A great aim – even if they didn’t entirely succeed. There was this wise monk in the Middle Ages, Thomas à Kempis, who said: ‘All … DESIRE peace, but very few desire the things that MAKE for peace.’ Ok, so the UN isn’t perfect, but then neither am I! If I can’t get my act together, how can I expect the whole world to be any different?

So for 2012, each time I enter Methodist Central Hall - that's pretty well every day - I resolve to say a prayer for world peace. What’s more, I’ll remind myself that if I really want to see peace, I must start with ME … even if it means channeling energy into forgiving … rather than aggressive behaviour with a hammer!