The people of “Murder Mile” need a sanctuary.

Fortunately for the residents of this gritty, bleak neighborhood in northern Belfast, they have one in an old Presbyterian church, which paradoxically stands in one of the most Catholic areas of the city.

The church is protected by a 10-foot-tall sharp metal fence topped with spinning spikes. The coils of razor wire surrounding it resemble thorny bushes that would make the place seem weed-ridden — if there were any vegetation around.

Most of the residents of this neighborhood, the New Lodge district, are republicans, meaning they support the free state of the Republic of Ireland and oppose British rule in Northern Ireland. During the violent, bloody era known as “The Troubles” that spanned from the late 1960s until a peace agreement was passed in 1998, 20 percent of all the ethno-political murders occurred within one mile of the church. Hence the nickname, “Murder Mile.”

The church is home to a charitable organization whose mission is to build relationships between the viciously torn religious and political communities of Belfast, where the territorial lines between Catholics and Protestants, republicans and unionists, are as sharp as concertina wire.

The group offers job training, day care and reaches out to young males through boxing lessons to teach them discipline and build camaraderie with other youths who may have different views than their own.

This group is one of many organizations working to educate people from both communities to live in harmony to ensure there will be no repeat of The Troubles.

Last summer, I traveled to Northern Ireland as part of the Young Ambassador program offered by the Friends of Saint Patrick organization in America and the Saint Patrick Centre in Northern Ireland.

The Saint Patrick Centre is both a museum dedicated to the life and work of St. Patrick, as well as a non-profit organization aimed at building cross-community relationships in Northern Ireland to change the mindset of the younger generation and end the divisiveness that led to The Troubles.

For two weeks with eight other college-aged students from across the country, I visited integrated schools that both Catholic and Protestant students may attend, which is, shockingly, only a recent move in Northern Ireland.

I met politicians including former IRA leader Martin McGuinness and current Irish Taoiseach (pronounced “Tea-shook,” a position equivalent to prime minister) Brian Cowen.

I had meals with local families, wrote stories for a community newspaper and heard firsthand accounts of the violence that took lives and tore families apart because of religious and ethnic intolerance.

What astounded me most was the tension that was present in these parts of Belfast. There was a sense of duty, of obligation to one’s heritage, that taught many of these people they must never reconcile with the enemies from the other side of the religious and political fence. To do so, in their minds, would be disloyalty.

Ethnic warfare is something I’d always associated with Sudan, the Middle East, Tibet and South Africa. But here in Belfast, in a Western, industrialized country, was a history of ethnic warfare akin to Al-Qaida. To be frank, I’d never thought of ethnic war as white people killing white people.

And the violence isn’t all in the past, either. Just last week, a car bomb blew up in the city of Newry, County Down, damaging a courthouse and a church. The bomb was the largest in a decade and has been attributed to republican extremists. Since then, more bomb threats have been made.

The Young Ambassador program is open to 20- to 25-year-olds. Housing, travel and airfare are covered by the Saint Patrick Centre.

Ambassadors from a wide range of academic specialties are chosen, from political science to education, anthropology to social work.

The ambassadors I traveled with created a full pallet that painted a complete understanding for me of the history and factors contributing to the situation in Northern Ireland.

My experience there last summer opened my eyes to the conflict that is still present in the land of my ancestors. I gained an understanding that’s simply not attainable through literature alone.

The land is beautiful, the work is meaningful and you can take the benefits home with you to understand the destructiveness of intolerance and the need for harmony across cultures.

Marquette students trained in Ignatian ideals will likely find much value in such a program. The application deadline for the Young Ambassador program is Saint Patrick’s Day, March 17. Applications can be filled out at youngambassadorprogram.com.

Reconciliation takes very hard work and requires constant diligence. But a phrase that hangs above a punching bag in the boxing room of that Presbyterian church in the Murder Mile sums up the importance of conflict resolution: “The more you sweat, the less you bleed.”