大象传媒

The National Eisteddfod opens in Llanelli next weekend, with organisers hoping to attract more than 150,000 visitors to this festival of music, literature and all things Welsh.

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Despite the processions of robed druids adding a tinge of the exotic to the big set-piece occasions, it is not a religious event.听 But churches and other faith groups will be well represented, and thousands will be in the big pavilion for a morning service and sing favourite hymns in a traditional cymanfa ganu.

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Those occasions can mask an acute crisis in the life of the Welsh-speaking churches and chapels which once dominated the nation鈥檚 religious landscape.听听 Membership is in freefall, a high proportion of ministers will soon have retired, and with relatively few exceptions, young people are in very short supply.听听

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What鈥檚 the future of Christianity lived through the medium of Welsh?听 And why do many believers insist that the language is a vital component of their faith?

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Roy Jenkins is joined by Dr Menna Machreth , who served two years as chair of the campaigning Welsh Language Society, and is now mission co-ordinator for the Baptist Union of Wales and the agency BMS world mission..

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Rev Dr Patrick Thomas, Parish priest in Carmarthen and听 canon chancellor of St.David鈥檚 Cathedral and a former member of the Welsh Language Board.听

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And by historian and educational consultant Dr Elin Jones, who among many other jobs advises on the use of Welsh in health and social services and was first chair of a Christian community centre in her home village of Ystrad Mynach.听