Trade talks

Long days and even longer nights in the hothouse meeting rooms of Doha.

Corridors crowded with heads bowed in conspiratorial conversations over subsections and nuances.

Alliances forged and falling apart as we manoeuvre for maximum advantage.

Risk and responsibility weighed and reassessed almost by the half hour as targets, deadlines and opportunities rattle closer and pass us by.

The press pressing for news and seeking out any hint of what might be and all the time all of us trying to guard our tongues.

Truly good and gifted people with oodles of experience and passionate commitment trying our best in the midst of all this international power ballet to do the right things to make the world better.

Nationalism and internationalism, globalisation and regionalisation, development and protection, market share and import restrictions, Special Products and Special Safeguard Mechanisms – the words we barter with speak of the politics of the possible and the possibilities of our politics.

And the lack of sleep making us highly strung and inclined to impatience.

The gathering of the World Trade Organisation is our cross and our cradle.

Here we both grasp after the hope of a transformation in the chances of the poorest and taste the bitter reality of that hope proving again to be so hard to fashion.

Here complexity and compromise weigh heavily.

But here, too, there are shifts and changes that mark a deepening commitment to shape the workings of global markets closer to the needs of the poor.

Arguments that used to be the preserve of a few on the sidelines are at the heart of the agenda now.

Power need not always corrupt.

Wealth need not always dazzle.

Imagination, love and justice can be spoken of.

So to you, dear God, we give the ending of these talks.

We give you thanks for all that has been good and for the forging of relationships in favour of the poor and dispossessed.

We praise you for your Spirit's words in the voices of those who have been heard speaking up for fairness.

We honour the commitment of many who are the travellers to these talks and many other gatherings like them at which truth and power must speak to one another.

But we confess again our shared failure to do enough to get things right.

Still it seems easier to worry about protecting what we have than to truly open the way for others who scrabble to stay alive to enter into abundance.

Again we have seen hopes dashed and expectations lowered, and we confess that we can become used to inadequacy.

So, God who hears the cries of slaves, keep us unsettled, restless and ill at ease until all your children truly live.

Keep alive in us the passion that keeps us alert and active.

Never let our faith and hope dim.

Keep us learning and working.

Keep us campaigning until the campaign succeeds.

For we are your children, and Jesus teaches us what your children must do.

Amen.

By the Rev Neil Thorogood, Director of Pastoral Studies, Westminster College, Cambridge

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