Wales: History, Politics, Culture

Dynamic Force, Trojan Horse The First World War and its impact on the Christian churches of Wales . . . . As the franchise was extended during the Nineteenth century Wales became increasingly opposed (at least electorally)to war. Henry Richard elected MP for Merthyr Boroughs in the 1868 general election was a notable member of the Peace Society which eschewed war, and despite being an anti-slavery activist was also opposed to the American Civil War. The 1900 election saw Wales vote for the generally anti-Imperialist Liberals such as Lloyd George, as opposed to England which voted heavily in favour of the Conservative under Lord Salisbury who promoted and waged the South African War. This echoed the attitude of the principality fifteen years earlier when Wales had overwhelmingly favoured the liberal Prime Minister Herbert Gladstone who lost a great deal of support due his reluctance to involve British forces in overseas ventures. Gladstone encountered particular political difficul...

  English Bible, English Revolution; Welsh Bible, no Welsh Revolution One of the big issues which triggered the Reformation was the question of the Bible. The Roman Catholic Church insisted that it be restricted to Latin, so as to preserve the monopoly of its knowledge to the priestly class and the educated sections of society. By way of contrast Protestant Reformers emphasised the priesthood of all believers and insisted on the need for every Christian to read the Scriptures in his own tongue. A s early as 1380 John Wycliffe began translating the Bible into English but suffered for this in the wake of the upheaval of the Peasants’ Revolt. However, he fared better than William Tyndale who translated the whole Bible and ended up being condemned for heresy in the Netherlands before being executed by strangulation and burning at the stake in 1536. In Wales the first translation of the New Testament into Welsh was completed in 1567, the first fruits of a 1563 statute requiring a We...