Last year the world's media attention focused on the South Pacific island of Tikopia where hundreds of people were feared dead after a cyclone.

For five days, all contact with the island was lost. Reconnaissance flights showed massive destruction and little sign of life.

When a photographer was finally landed by helicopter, he witnessed nothing less than a miracle.

Every one of the 100 or so islanders had survived the 200-mph winds.

It turned out they had fled along paths they've used for centuries during cyclone emergencies to seek shelter in mountain caves from the howling winds and the gigantic waves that swept over the island.

Here, I thought is a parable of the importance of the faith communities in our city as guardians of the ancient paths of the interior life.

Had the islanders forgotten the interior caves and the ancient paths they would have perished, finding no hiding place on the surface of the island.

So it is with a superficial society, one that has forgotten the interior life.

When the storms of life buffet us we can be secured by the spiritual disciplines, by the routes that lead us deeper into God which are preserved in our several faith communities.

Brighton and Hove has a multitude of these communities and they are vital to the welfare of our city.

A recent survey of the churches alone showed about 300 examples of church-sponsored community activities engaging with children and young people, lesbians and gays, the homeless, asylum-seekers and so on.

Whatever people may say about religion, the surveys show our faith communities are doing a lot of good building the quality of life in our city.

The best thing, though, faith communities have to offer us is the keeping in mind and practising of spiritual disciplines, the "ancient paths" for the soul which involve contemplation, holding oneself to revealed truth in scripture, sacramental rites and a rich variety of age-old religious practice.

If it is the interior life that matters ultimately, those groups in our city that preserve the proven spiritual disciplines are a form of security helping people both to withstand adversity and to gain the inner strength they need to be of service to their fellow citizens.

Rev Dr John Twisleton

-New Church Road, Hove