Question 164, from Tessa, UK

I work with for a fair trade organisation. A lot of my customers are not permitted by their churches to hold fair trade stalls on Sundays, which is frustrating for both activists and supporters. Our official view is that Jesus’ anger at the trading that took place in the temple was specifically to do with unjust scales, precisely the situation fair trade is helping to challenge. But from a personal point of view it would be interesting to see a deeper theological analysis of the debate – “should churches sell fair trade on Sundays?”

It is interesting that since the late 1980s when there was a concerted political campaign in the UK to prevent Sunday trading and ‘Keep Sunday Special’, shopping on Sundays is much more acceptable for Christians these days. In fact, many of the arguments made by the Keep Sunday Special campaigners were prescient – Sunday has become (more…)

Jon the freelance theologian preached this address at the 10th Anniversary Thanksgiving Service for Fair Do’s Ltd, Cardiff’s premier fair trade shop, on 4 October 2008.

A few years ago my friend Nick, who told us why he is thankful for Fair Do’s earlier, was interviewing various people about why they were involved in fair trade. It was for some academic paper; I have to admit I don’t know the details. Having talked to Nick, I wasn’t sure he knew the details either, but I agreed to do an interview.

So we sat and we chatted about fair trade, and I explained how and why I would identify my faith as an integral reason for being passionate about fair trade. Now I realise not everyone here would identify themselves as a Christian, and if you aren’t thank you for coming and celebrating with us anyway, but for me, and many of us at Fair Do’s our faith and our commitment to fair trade are intertwined.

Fair trade meshes with the Christian story for many reasons. (more…)