News & Items of Interest

Cheese and Wine

There was a cheese and wine evening on Friday 9th Setember at St. Peter's Chruch, Machynlleth. The evening was very well attended and gave the opportunity for everyone to enjoy friendly company, sparkling conversation and to see the new facilities on the mezzanine floor at the church.

Rev. Kathleen was kept very busy welcoming everyone, and printed sheets were available detailing how to hire and make use of the facilities.

Many thanks go to all the people who heled organise the evening, Rachel Richards who took the photos and to the Co-Op for kindly providing the food.

On Saturday 6th August we at Corris Church helped celebrate the marriage of Dannii and Ben. It was a joyous family occasion blessed with good weather. The presence of their very well behaved dog Lara complete with camera made the day. It was especially good to have Dannii 's grand parents, Eufyl and Pat Williams present both looking very well. We wish Dannii and Ben every happiness in the next stage of their lives.

The Reverend Gwynn ap Gwilym

It is with sadness that we heard of the untimely passing on the 30th July of The Revd. Gwynn ap Gwilym; a son of this valley, rector of Penegoes, Darowen and Llanbrynmair from 1986, and from 1997 to 2004, rector of Mallwyd, Darowen, Llanbrynmair, Cemaes and Llanymawddwy. We offer our condolences to his wife Mari and brother Ifor.

Gwynn was a man of great intellect, who could truly claim to walk in the footsteps of the great 16-17th century Welsh academic and biblical scholar Dr John Davies of Mallwyd. As well as lecturing in Aberystwyth University on Biblical studies - especially The Old Testament, we were privileged to listen to him preach from Sunday to Sunday.

Church life was never dull with Gwynn around, and controversy never far away. I can still remember clearly the sermon he preached in Llanymawddwy Church many years ago at the time of some dispute with the members (can't remember what the argument was about) and we got it with both barrels! The theme 2 Samuel 11 -12; the story of King David, Bathsheba and Uriah, a story of adultery and duplicity; and then the rebuke of Nathan. - The rich man refusing to kill one of his many hundreds of lambs for the feast, insisting that the poor man kill his one and only lamb. You can guess who we were compared to in the story. Tell you what, we were talking about that sermon for weeks!

Gwynn left us in 2004, his final service was to be on Sunday 27th October, but fate intervened.  A terrible storm blew up on the Saturday night, trees blown down, electricity cut off, service cancelled. I wonder how Gwynne was going to address us in his final sermon? He made a point of recording the biblical reference in the Mallwyd Church register – Proverbs 29.19.

“You cannot discipline (correct) a servant with words only, even though he understands, he will not respond (pay attention).”

Strong words to pick from the whole of the Bible, to leave as a legacy after 18 years work. Was Gwynn expressing frustration at his own failure, as he might have seen it, to change peoples' lives by his words and teaching? Or was he saying that words were not enough and that, he, Gwynn, was not a good  enough example in his personal life for others to feel able to follow, in a life of Christ? Either way, I think Gwynn would have been too hard on himself. Or was Gwynn going to castigate us as being too cold, to hard hearted to respond to the Christian message? Maybe, but that would have been very hard on us!

Perhaps Gwynn, on that dramatic day, was going to focus on a key word “servant,”

 “You cannot disciple a servant with words only.” In order to avoid the difficult conclusions above, perhaps we have to stop thinking of ourselves as servants, victims or passive ciphers, but take our lives in our own hands, become our own masters, embrace the love of God and stop expecting others to turn the tap on for us? The Christian transformation has to come from within.

We shall never know what was on Gwynn's mind, perhaps he was referring to himself as the “servant,” pointing out to us that, all our words of criticism were simply hypocritical.