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A spiritual comment and prayer to start the day with the Very Revd Dr Sarah Rowland Jones

Good morning, bore da, from St Davids, the UK's smallest city, on Wales’ westernmost peninsula - the home of the 6th century holy man, whom Welsh people everywhere celebrate today, as our nation’s Patron Saint.
But why have a Patron Saint? Isn't that something of an anachronism in the 21st century?

Well, there's doubtless a wider debate to be had, but I want to speak up for Dewi Sant, as we call him in Welsh, and for the value of his particular legacy to people of all faiths and none.

Though details of his life are scant, there was something about the quality of his life that has echoed down the centuries.

Perhaps most famously, he is known for the advice in his final sermon. Echoing words from St Paul he said: be joyful, keep the faith, and do the little things that you have seen and heard in me.
Dewi’s words can be our moral compass:

• First, be joyful – be generous and open-hearted; share optimism and holy hope; encourage one another and draw out the best in others,
• keep the faith - live with integrity and honesty; be upright and trustworthy; and keep your word;
• and finally, do the little things: be kind, in lives of diligence and perseverance in all that is good and right and true.
When this is our aim, we can be sure that God will help us as he helped Dewi.

Let us pray: thank you, Lord, for the moral heroes and exemplars of the faith of past generations. Help us to play our part today in leaving a legacy of good for tomorrow. Amen.