Since the Reformation Wales has been an overwhelmingly Protestant society with the established Church of England in a dominant position. Alongside the Church of England, and increasingly powerful as time went on, were the dissenting denominations, which were inspired by similar reforming movements in England and which had their strongest appeal along the borderlands and in the southern coastal districts. The most profound indigenous Welsh religious awakening was the Methodist revival of the eighteenth century, which in turn led to a reinvigoration of the charity school movement through the vehicle of Griffith Jones’s “circulating schools.” The itinerant teachers of these schools provided instruction in Welsh, and, in conjunction with the next generation’s Welsh-language Sunday schools, had a significant impact both on teaching the masses how to read and write and in laying the foundations for national consciousness as Wales sought to differentiate itself from England.
Following industrialization, it was nonconformist leaders who shaped the contours of modern Wales, establishing such major national institutions as the University of Wales, the National Museum of Wales, and the National Library of Wales. The apogee of the nonconformist challenge to the religious status quo was the disestablishment in 1920 of the Church of England and its replacement by a separate Welsh version of the Anglican communion, known as the Church in Wales. Although Wales has become increasingly secular since World War II and is now far more pluralistic in its religious complexion, the social values of nonconformity have had a huge influence on Welsh education, family life, work practices, national institutions, and political development.
No comprehensive analysis of the religious affiliation of Welsh settlers in early Canada has been done, but it appears that most Welsh were affiliated to the Church of England and to various Presbyterian denominations. In time, other denominations – Baptists, Congregationalists, and Wesleyan Methodists – also took root and were strengthened by the influx of new immigrants, especially at the beginning of the twentieth century. Smaller denominations such as the Salvation Army, the Open Brethren (branch of Plymouth Brethren), and the Unitarians were also represented among Welsh. From World War I onwards Welsh-Canadian Baptists, Congregationalists, and Methodists (the latter two as part of the United Church of Canada after 1925) were particularly active in a variety of social reform movements.
Welsh Christians also played an important role in proselytizing Canada’s native peoples. Among them was the Anglican minister David Thomas Jones, who ministered to the Indians and Metis of the Red River colony in the period 1823–38. Another was English-born James Evans, a Wesleyan missionary to the Canadian west who in 1836 devised a syllabic form of writing for Ojibwa and in 1840 a similar alphabet for Cree. He translated and printed many Christian hymns, prayer books, and religious publications in these new literary languages. Perhaps the most famous missionary was Peter Jones, known to the native peoples as Kahkewaquonaby (Sacred Feathers). His father was a Welsh surveyor and his mother an Ojibwa woman. After his conversion to Christianity in 1823 Jones became the first native Methodist missionary to the Ojibwa and, with his brother John, translated the Scriptures into Ojibwa. Farther west was another English-born Welshman, the Reverend Ephraim Evans, who led a group of Methodist missionaries to work among the native peoples of British Columbia in February 1859.
Many Welsh clergy belonged to the Anglican Church and were influential in shaping its character and direction in Canada. Most served as parish priests and were strong supporters of Anglican missionary work in the nineteenth century through the Church Missionary Society and the Colonial and Continental Church Society. In 1905 the formation of the Missionary Society of the Church in Canada continued this evangelical outreach and, under its auspices, Welsh-Canadian clergy became more active in educational and social-welfare issues. Among the Welsh Anglicans who assumed leadership roles in their church were Derwyn T. Owen, primate of Canada from 1934 to 1946; David Williams, the fourth Bishop of Huron (Ontario) from 1905 and the first archbishop of Huron and metropolitan of the ecclesiastical province of Ontario in 1926; and John Plummer Derwent Llwyd, appointed vice-provost of Trinity College, University of Toronto, in 1905 and dean of Nova Scotia in 1912, who typified those Welsh clergy who played an important part in the establishment and support of Canadian schools, colleges, and universities.
Welsh members of the Anglican Church in Canada worshipped almost exclusively in English. In contrast, many of the early settlements grew up around Welsh-language Methodist or Baptist chapels. Aside from their religious services, these chapels continued the Welsh traditions of Cymanfaoedd Ganu (singing festivals), Eisteddfodau Y Seiat (fellowship meetings where both religious and secular topics were addressed), and Yr Ysgol Sul (Sunday Bible school, which taught many settlers to read and write).
Unlike Scottish or English nonconformist congregations, Welsh chapels, motivated partly by a desire to maintain the Welsh language, sought and acquired a fair degree of autonomy from larger denominational structures. During the first two generations of settlement, from about 1860 to 1914, the autonomy of the Welsh chapels helped to strengthen Welsh community life, but as the numbers of Welsh-speaking immigrants declined, the chapels were required either to become bilingual or to serve as the nucleus of expanded English-speaking congregations. Nevertheless, it was nonconformist ministers who formed the core of the Welsh cultural intelligentsia in Canada for well over a century. They were the prime movers in the establishment of Welsh newspapers, journals, choirs, and St David’s societies across the country.
Few of the Welsh chapels survive. The exception and best known is the Dewi Sant United Welsh Church, on Melrose Avenue in Toronto, whose ministers and congregation have played a central part in the Welsh life of the city. In 1909, two years after the establishment of the St David’s Society of Toronto, Welsh Christians formed their own chapel (then known as the Capel Dewi Sant) and affiliated to the Welsh Presbyterian Church of America, which financially supported the fledging congregation in its early years. By 1924 the membership of the chapel had grown to 160 (with 24 Sunday school children). Most members lived in tightly clustered Welsh communities around Pembroke, Ontario, Sherbourne, Parliament, Jarvis, and Carleton streets in downtown Toronto.
In June 1925 the creation of the United Church of Canada sparked an intense debate among members of Toronto’s Welsh church, with many seeing the new denomination as an alternative to dependence upon the Welsh Presbyterian Church of America. In 1928 the Reverend William Davies successfully negotiated the entry of the Toronto Welsh church into the United Church. Membership of the Dewi Sant United Welsh Church, as it became known, declined during the Depression of the 1930s but recovered after World War II. As a result of the leadership of successive Welsh pastors from 1945 to the present day – Heddwyn Williams, Humphreys Jones, Elwyn Hughes, and Caerwyn Davies (present incumbent) – the church became a vibrant centre of Christian witness. Today most services are held in English, although a Welsh-language Sunday evening service is still held each month. The congregation is comprised of 150 second- and third-generation Welsh Canadians.
