Welsh community races to save chapel where Cwm Rhondda hymn first sung | Wales

A Galli Society launched a campaign to save the chapel where the popular HYMN CWM Rhonda or the bread of heaven was first told.

In 1907, composer John Hughes wrote the hymn to celebrate a new organ in Capel Rhonda in Hopkinstown near Pontypridd.

II. The building, listed in the classroom, closed its doors in December after years of congregations and was offered for sale by the Baptist Union for £ 47,000 two months ago.

Growing up in Hopkinstown, Rhian Hopkins said he was “collapsed” when he passed the chapel and noticed the sales sign.

“I could not stop thinking about how this piece of history could disappear or that it could be transformed into apartments by a property developer who could take it with anything,” he said. “I arranged a view and I got an architect friend who says the building was good.”

Hopkins and other campaignists established a last -minute mass funding on July 17 the day before the deadline for potential buyer offers. The union extended the deadline until July 28th to give the chance to reach the target of the donation collection. As of Wednesday, 65% of the total – £ 31,000 – was promised.

Hopkins said: “At a time when the world may feel very gloomy, this community effort seems to be echoed with people, and although we no longer feel our need to participate in a religious service every Sunday, it reminds us that we need areas and events that we can come together as a community.”

Residents of Hopkinstown hopes that Capel Rhonda can be protected as a community space by focusing on choirs and gallic language groups. “We have many ideas about how the building can be used in the future, but we want to interact with the people living in the village to find out what they need and what they need.

More difficulties are ahead of us, Hopkins accepted. “The first step is to secure the building. Then we need to create a kind of charity… There are things like all kinds of maintenance and repair costs, heating and maintenance, and thinking such things,” he said.

According to research conducted by the leading Galli Public Policy Aid Organization and Thinktank, Bevan Foundation, as the congregations decreased, about a quarter of the Wales of Wales of Wales closed in the last decade.

The chapels in Wales have been transformed into private houses or second houses and holiday permits.