‘We haven’t had to go looking for a single tenant – they’ve come to us,’ explains Christian Tucker-Williams, Senior Coordinator of the BUW Corporation. For some years now the Corporation has been pursuing a new strategy when a church closes and a chapel building loses its original purpose. Now this strategy is starting to bear fruit, with encouraging examples developing in different parts of the country.
Tabor, Cross Hands
Membership numbers were declining at Tabor, and as the church started to think about the future they approached BUW for advice early in the process. Christian went to meet them and helped them consider different options for the way forward. Eventually, it became clear in this case that bringing the church cause to an end would be the best option – but it was obvious to all that the site had real potential and church members wanted to see good use of the building, and supported Union staff to assess the different possibilities.
In June 2024 Menter Iaith Cwm Gwendraeth Elli – a local Welsh language social enterprise – took a 5-year lease on the vestry at Tabor and set about creating a Welsh-language community hub there, drawing the community into the work as they did so. As Alaw, the Enterprise Manager, explained when we visited, “We’re really happy here. It’s worked so well for children and young people – the place is busy pretty much every day now!” As well as a ‘Pryd ar Glud’ / ‘Meals on Wheels’ service providing fresh food to people in their homes in the surrounding villages, there are yoga sessions in Welsh, an afterschool children’s club, a youth theatre, mums and tots group and a host of local associations hiring the space – as well parents using it for parties!
“What we’ve enjoyed too,” says Alaw as he shows us the Community Garden that is now developing outside the vestry, “is that we have former members of the church who used to meet here regularly come here as well – it’s lovely that they’re part of the new chapter!”
In coming to an agreement with the Menter Iaith, the Union ensured in the lease that a number of hours a week of use of the building remained with the Baptist family, and is looking into creative, Christian possibilities for the future at the site.
Gorseinon – Seion Noddfa
“It was a real privilege and encouragement to be invited to the service for the reopening of the Seion building – albeit with a new church congregation! As a result, a larger church is now providing a Christian witness in the middle of Gorseinon’s high street,” Christian shared.
Seion Noddfa was originally founded as a daughter church of Penuel church, Loughor in 1899. The congregation was shrinking, particularly after the two years of Covid, and similarly to Tabor, the members decided to reach out to the Union to discuss the situation and the future. All options were considered and prayed over – and the members decided that they were being led to return to the mother church and formally unite both congregations, creating Penuel Newydd church (which now meets on Penuel’s site in Gorseinon).
That left Seion’s site on the high street – which had once seen Billy Graham preaching on a visit to Wales – standing empty. Riverside Christian Fellowship had been worshipping at the Institute in Gorseinon, without a home of its own. It just so happened one day around this time that one of the leaders of Penuel Newydd bumped into one of the officers of Riverside in the local supermarket, and that led to the unexpected idea of leasing Seion’s building to Riverside. They as a church now meet there weekly on Sundays and run midweek activities from the high street location as well.
Other churches
That is not the only example where it’s been possible to lease a chapel building to a congregation of another denomination that had no home of its own. Not far from Gorseinon in the town of Pontarddulais the cause of Y Babell Baptist church had ended, and the property had passed into the care of the BUW Corporation. Carmel Apostolic church heard locally about this and asked if they could rent the space, coming to a 10-year lease agreement with the BUW Corporation in the summer of 2024. Discussions of a similar nature are currently taking place in relation to the Zion building, Llanwrtyd Wells in mid-Wales also.
As Christian notes, “We have to put these buildings to good use – that may not always mean leasing out to a church, but the key thing is that we reuse these buildings for the sake of the future and our mission, unlocking the investment and sacrifice our forefathers made in erecting them, for the cause of Christ today!”