In the early 4th century in Roman Britain, two martyrs, Julius and Aaron, were executed in Caerleon. Alongside the more famous St. Alban, these two are amongst the only martyrs in Roman Britain. Julius and Aaron’s deaths would begin a long-lasting Christian tradition in the South of Wales.
Legend would have it that Lucius of Britain, an alleged King of the Britons, in the 2nd century is credited with having introduced Christianity to Britain. According to the tradition, Lucius wrote to Pope Eleutherius to make him a Christian and his people followed suit.
Whilst Lucius’ existence is doubtful, what we do know is that in 314, three British Bishops attended the Council of Arles, suggesting the existence of an organised Church hierarchy in the province. Another point of interest is that the four original dioceses of Wales before the Reformation, Bangor, St. David’s, St. Asaph and Llandaff, all follow similar borders of the four pre-Roman Briton tribes: the Silures, Demetae, Ordovices and Deceangli.
The Welsh Church would enter a period of Saints between 500-700AD, establishing a separate monastic tradition from that of Saint Augustine in England. For example, Saint Dyfrig, who was a Romano-British Bishop from Herefordshire and established one of the first monasteries in the province at Hentland.
The modern Archdiocese of Cardiff-Menevia encompasses the old Catholic Dioceses of Llandaff, Hereford and Saint David’s, which all still exist today but as a part of the Anglican communion following the Reformation. All three of these have a long and storied history, Hereford is the oldest Diocese in England, Llandaff was allegedly founded in 560 by Saint Teilo, and St. David’s was founded, by not surprisingly, by Saint David in the later half of the 6th Century.
The Welsh Church maintained its independence until around 872, when tradition has it that they recognised the authority of the English province of Canterbury, and by 930 the first Anglo-Saxon Bishop, Wulfrith, had been appointed. When the Normans conquered South Wales in the 11th century, Canterbury began to exert even more influence over the Welsh Church.
When the Reformation came around and the Act of Supremacy was passed in 1559, all the Catholic Bishops were deposed, except Bishop Anthony Kitchin of Llandaff who acquiesced to the demands, and their Sees were suppressed by Rome. Catholicism in the British Isles was effectively rendered illegal, and it would be another 65 years until the Church received leadership from the Papacy.
In 1623 the Apostolic Vicariate of England and Wales was formed, but it wouldn’t be until 1685 that an actual Bishop was able to set foot in the isles without being arrested or dying. Catholicism in Wales would continue in this ad-hoc form until 1850, following the Universalis Eccelsiae which re-established the Roman Catholic hierarchy.
The Archdiocese of Cardiff in its current form emerged in 1916, and in 1920 St. David’s Cathedral was officially made the metropolitan Cathedral. The rest of Wales was split into the Dioceses of Wrexham and Menevia and continued to be this way until September 2024 when Pope Francis officially merged Cardiff with Menevia.
The Columban Mission Awareness and Appeals Team are visiting the Archdiocese of Cardiff during 2025 to preach the Annual Mission Appeal. We look forward to meeting some of the 154,000 Catholics in the Archdiocese on our visits to parishes. If your parish is keen to hear more about Columban Mission from our team and you’ve not yet scheduled a visit, please email Adam Williams on adam.williams@columbans.co.uk.
