For the past 4 years Gareth Hall has been a Humanist Chaplain and Community Cohesion Officer in North East Wales.
In both of these roles Gareth often heard from faith/belief community leaders that there needed to be more opportunities to make interfaith connections across North Wales.
In response to this need, in partnership with Glyndŵr Chaplaincy Gareth launched the Chaplains Connecting Communities programme in January 2020, and began facilitating new interfaith engagement online, in person and via awareness raising campaigns on social media. In November of that year he hosted the first online North Wales Interfaith Forum – this was an opportunity for people of all faiths and beliefs to discover shared values and discuss new initiatives to bring our communities closer together.
This forum was attended by representatives from Christian, Muslim, Quaker, Pagan, Baháʼí and Humanist communities, who asked that the forum become an annual event. 2 further forums were hosted in 2021 and 2022. In 2022, two live interfaith events were hosted at the Wrexham Islamic Cultural Centre and Wrexham Methodist Church. These events were titled “Finding Agreement” – the beginning of a series of discussion based events focusing on what people of all faiths and beliefs have in common.
In response to these events, attendees collectively expressed a wish to have these positive and meaningful interactions – online and in person – on a more regular basis.
In order to achieve this, the Chaplains Connecting Communities programme was concluded in May 2023, and the North Wales Interfaith Network was formed, with the intent to deliver an interfaith initiative with additional resources and funding, and a broader remit to network more widely across North Wales.
Bangor Interfaith organiser Penny Kemp and Coleg Cambria Chaplain Tim Feak have now joined Gareth as NWI Coordinators, and annual funding has been secured by North East Wales Community Cohesion, with discussion underway to match this funding via North West Wales Community Cohesion in 2024.
The NWI network now includes over 70 faith/belief representatives from across North Wales who receive monthly email updates about interfaith activities and events in the region, and a growing core group of members who attend monthly online NWI meetings.
At these meetings, members ask and answer questions to learn more about each other’s beliefs, share positive and inspirational messages from texts of their choice, share updates from their own faith/belief centres, and help to plan and organise upcoming interfaith events.
On November 17th 2023, we marked National Inter Faith Week by welcoming 20 guests to our third Finding Agreement interfaith event, hosted at the Acton Community Resource Centre.
A full gallery of images from this event are available to see on our NWI Facebook page.
On February 27th 2024, we hosted an interfaith panel discussion at Ysgol Clywedog for their Cultural Diversity Day. Since that event, we have begun consultation on the development of a new interfaith and reflection space at the school.
The NWI Network has also been invited to host an Interfaith Experience at the 2024 Llangollen International Eisteddfod on July 3rd.
Moving forward, every faith/belief representative in North Wales has an open invitation to join the North Wales Interfaith Network – to forge friendships, to learn from each other, and to work in partnership to nurture more inclusive communities.
We believe we are better together.
