World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought

Prayer for the Day presented by Reverend Dr Rosa Hunt, minister of Tabernacl chapel in the city centre of Cardiff.

Hello. Today is the World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought. This is a topic close to my heart because I have just returned from taking some of our church youth group to visit our partner church in Lesotho, a small kingdom entirely surrounded by South Africa. What Lesotho has in abundance is one thing its giant neighbour desperately lacks: water.

The Lesotho Highlands Water Project, was the grand solution: build a series of large dams high in the Lesotho mountains, capture that water, and send it north into South Africa.

But it’s not all good news. Large dams of this kind have displaced highland communities and flooded land. Campaigners have raised questions about compensation and there have been corruption scandals too.

A poor mountain kingdom selling its purest natural resource to a wealthier neighbour. This is a story about water as both blessing and bargaining chip.

Lord of the whole earth, we ask your forgiveness for the ways in which our inept and greedy stewardship of the earth’s resources has led to great injustice. We thank you for the intelligence and skills of politicians and engineers who find ways of redistributing these resources. Give them wisdom so that none may be exploited and all might be blessed. In the name of your son Jesus Christ, who urged all who were thirsty to come to him and drink deep of his living water of justice, mercy, forgiveness and love, Amen.