Plenary, 04 Mar 2009

Meeting date: Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Official Report 353KB pdf

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Time for Reflection

Good afternoon. The first item of business this afternoon is time for reflection. I am genuinely delighted to welcome today, to lead our time for reflection, my good friend the Rt Hon the Lord Elis-Thomas, the Presiding Officer of the National Assembly for Wales.

Thank you, Presiding Officer, for inviting me to lead time for reflection in Parliament at the beginning of Lent, immediately following the feast of St David—Dewi Sant—the patron saint of Wales.

Some 1,420 years after Dewi's death, sceptical politicians, who discover differing versions of truth in our daily media, will not be surprised to find hagiography and mythology abounding in the written lives of the age of saints. I am drawn to the description of Dewi preaching to an assembly in Llanddewibrefi: to improve his visibility to his congregation, he is uplifted as the ground on which he stands rises beneath him, forming a hill, and a dove lands on his shoulder. Such elevation of leadership before the public rarely, if ever, happens to political leaders.

It was by popular vote that Dewi became patron saint of Wales—more than 60 of the ancient pre-Norman parish churches of Wales are consecrated in his name—with St Teilo being the runner up, with 25 votes. Those early Christian settlements all begin with the Welsh word "Llan". Even to this day, many villages and towns begin with this prefix, whose cognates are found in all Celtic languages, including the oldest—the Brythonic or British that was once spoken in this very part of the world. "Llan", which initially described an enclosure where produce is grown, came to mean a sacred enclosure, a monk's cell, a church and then the surrounding village or town at whose very heart, in the root of its name, is a spiritual space.

Such is our common history. In 10 years' time, we will be celebrating 100 years of the disestablishment of what was once the Church of England in Wales—the old mother church of yr Hen Fam, as she used to be described in Welsh. That was the beginning of 20th century devolution.

Wales in its devolved institutions takes the form of a secular state with no state prayers or even time for reflection at the start of its National Assembly meetings and no primacy for any one religious organisation. Churches Together in Wales—Cytûn lives alongside other faith communities and with all other aspects of civil society as another voluntary body. In a truly interfaith society, all faiths are regarded as equally valid and valuable by each faith community, and each community of faith shares its spiritual space with the community of communities of nation and world.

I am particularly pleased that Lord Elis-Thomas was able to come to Parliament today, as it is the closest possible sitting day to St David's day.