It takes effort and goodwill

David Jones on politics, goodwill and the Urdd Eisteddfod

IT was the great bard Williams Shakespeare who said that “All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players”.

Seems to me that the events of recent days have proved that. Politicians on all sides of the Brexit debate have made their entrances and exits on the media trying to impress us with their arguments and persuade us to support their point of view.

The European election results have added to the drama and if that wasn’t enough, there is, of course, a hotly contested leadership contest in the Conservative Party.

As far as knowing what the coming weeks will bring – your guess is as good as mine!

One thing we can all agree on is that politics is definitely not dull at the moment! Speaking of drama – there’s even more on offer this week. . . this time on a different stage, as many of us will be making our way to the Urdd Eisteddfod in Cardiff Bay.

This annual cultural event brings together the young talent of Wales in drama, music and the arts.

The ‘Urdd’, formed in 1922, works to promote the Welsh language and its culture among young people and the Eisteddfod serves as a worldwide mirror of this talent and gives many young people the opportunity of developing their musical and dramatic talents.

There’s also plenty of time to enjoy the fun events which make the Urdd so special. Although I never made it to the ‘stage’, I did compete with what I thought was an exceptional rendering of Y Wiwer, by Watkin Wynn at a local eisteddfod – and came third – my only claim to fame!

There is, of course, much more to the Urdd. Since the movement began in 1922, and every year since, the Urdd peace message of goodwill is broadcast every May from the young people of Wales to young people of the world, a tradition which continues and gets a ready response from many countries.

Already the comeback from the political world following the results of the European elections have been causing a stir. While mulling over the results it may well be the time for all sides to seek common ground and with an extra input of goodwill and compromise to get Brexit back on track again.

Jesus gave some sound commands to his followers when he spoke of going the extra mile, of turning the cheek and loving our neighbour. That takes some effort and a huge amount of goodwill.

Well, there’s a lot of it around in Cardiff Bay this week – hopefully it will be catching!