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Hiraeth:1

6 November 2009 2 Comments

‘Hiraeth’ is a welsh word that is untranslateable in English. It means something like ‘longing or yearning for home’ (I know at least one welsh speaker reads this and may be able to correct me).

Last week I spent a few days in North Wales. We lived there from 1999-2004. We had no connection with the place before; we must have been one of the few people who lived in Lancashire who did not know it (‘Hey up luv…this Clandudno is good isn’t it…better than that Ross on Sea…’).

I don’t know what it is about the place (Colwyn Bay, Rhos etc), but we have always missed it and tried to get back for a period of time each year. It could be that it is that our children were born there, that we have retained (and developed) friendships there, that it was my first experience of full time ministry, that our time there was cruelly and badly ended……. I don’t know. I just get an intense feeling of hiraeth when I think about the place and a feeling of ‘home’ when I’m around there, when I’m attempting to speak the ‘language of heaven’ (cymraeg!) once again.

Is God trying to tell me something, am I just nostalgic or is it pure wistfulness?

IMG_1639

…I’m getting wistful again….


2 Comments »

  • Dyfed said:

    Graham,
    As the ‘at least on Welsh speaker’ who follows your blog I loved this post! And you defined hiraeth correctly ;-)

    Whether God is speaking to you through your hiraeth or not I’m not sure. What I can say is that when you were with us you stood out: you stood out as someone who wanted to bring much needed reform to established church (without trying to trash the thing!); you stood out as a thinker in the midst of many leaders who just repeated the same old same old (conservative and liberal); you stood out as an Englishman who wanted to really be a part of a Welsh society and not pay some lip service.

    If you ever get called back then I for one would be very happy to see it happen.
    Dyfed.

    - 6 November 2009 at 10:47
  • graham (author) said:

    Thanks Dyfed: appreciate that!

    - 8 November 2009 at 20:58

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