Going, going, gone. What's at stake for the future of Welsh heritage?
The Survey shows that 15% of churches in Wales offer bilingual worship and an additional 12% use Welsh as the primary language. Places of Worship in Wales are not only guardians of stone and stained glass but also of language and identity, where services embody a cultural treasure unique to the United Kingdom.
Going, going, gone. What’s at stake for the future of Welsh heritage
In Wales, when the official language of education and the workplace became English, it was the Welsh ‘capel’ (chapel) that allowed much of the Welsh population to still meet and live part of their lives in Welsh. It is the capel that has ensured the survival of the Welsh language to this day.
Chapels are a defining feature ofthe Welsh landscape. But for how much longer? As chapels are converted, sold, or demolished, much of Wales’s cultural memory is in danger of being forgotten.
The heart of Welsh life
By Huw Powell–Davies, from Capel Bethesda in Mold, Flintshire
Capel Bethesda has a prominent place in the story of promoting the Welsh language here on the border and throughout Wales.
The church benefited from the contribution of writers, hymn writers, theologians and journalists who worked through the medium of Welsh from the beginning – people like Thomas Jones, Denbigh, Jane Owen, Roger Edwards and Daniel Owen who received encouragement at Bethesda and material for stories and novels in the characters and life of the chapel.
Welsh was the language of the Sunday school from the start, in 1806. Later in the middle of the 20th Century, a Welsh class was established here which eventually developed into two Welsh schools in the town.
The chapel has been at the heart of the Welsh life throughout the years, interweaving faith and culture and it continues to play its part in that work.