A Co-op Prayer from Botswana

A Co-op Prayer from Botswana*
Oodi Women's Weaver Co-operative
Botswana Cooperative Movement

Lord, save our cooperative, and keep it safe from the attention of:

- the academics who wish to pull it apart to find out how it works
- the professionals who seem to believe that nothing can be achieved by ordinary women and men without their help
- the advisers who never tire of finding new problems that they can pretend to be finding solutions for them
- the managers who think the Co-operative should work for them rather than they should work for it
- the politicians who seek to use the Co-operative as stepping stones to power
- the Governments which would bury it in bureaucracy
- the peddlers of dogma who want to make it fit their view of the world and will not accept that our Co-operative is simply a self-help enterprise bringing benefits to our members
- the investors who would try to take it over and cash in on our success.

Lord! Protect us from any such, often well-meaning, but interfering people who do not seem to understand that all we want to do is work harmoniously together to bring economic benefits to our members without harming or transgressing the rights of those outside the Co-operative. Amen.

*Thanks to Thomas Beckett for sharing this