It is also a very dear memory for me, as it was one of the first ones I got when I started to practice self-hypnosis. It was one of my first validations too, though currently I am convinced there were at least two white churches and I could have been confusing them... until the definite picture reached me.
The first time I talked about this white chapel was in one of my regressions:
There are a lot of people who are going or coming from a ceremony, I think it is a burial or a funeral. I get to see some kind of chapel in a high place, all white, but I am not sure it’s there where the ceremony has been conducted. I am walking (it seems down) a slope, I see other townsfolk at a certain distance, and I feel an immense sadness deep inside. I ask myself if it’s because Jan has died, and no, he hasn’t been the deceased one. What I feel is he will end up doing the same to me, he will end up making a “widow” of me. I think one day he won’t return from his journeys, because I think the sea always claims its victims, and one day he will be one of those victims.
Then I already knew I was in Cardiff, and I only suspected Jan had a Scandinavian origin, as I had a blurred and idealized image of him in my mind that had been there ever since I could remember. My first investigation led me to discover that there was indeed a white church in Cardiff. It was built in 1868 to provide religious services to the Norwegian community established there, mainly made of sailors. More than the church itself, the fact that caught my attention was the existence of that Norwegian community in Cardiff. I didn’t know anything about Cardiff before having those memories. I wasn’t even sure if Cardiff was in England or Wales. How could I know Cardiff was a coastal village and besides with such a close relation with Norwegian sailors? Coincidences were beginning to be too many...
However, I always had doubts that chapel was really the one I remembered. Further on I knew the ceremony was for a sailor, a Jan’s fellow countryman. In other memories I always used to compare this chapel with another church in Cardiff that I also could identify much later. I always said I liked the chapel much more: it was smaller, more luminous, you could breathe a lot of peace, the environment was warmer and more inviting.
It seems the White church of the Norwegian community was built in the bay area, and years later it was dismantled and taken to another area of Cardiff, where it can be seen today. It looked beautiful to me in the pictures, and I don’t discard I came to know it, but it didn’t transmit me any special feeling. Neither did it cause in me that sense of recognition I’ve experimented in other occasions.
I wrote:
The picture doesn’t look like what I saw at all. Besides, the chapel I saw was in a higher ground, though they do have a certain similarity.
It’s on a higher ground, and I think you can see the sea from up there. There is a dirt road that takes you to the door, and there is a lot of grass around, very well tended. At a certain distance it’s surrounded by a metal railing, because the terrain slopes down abruptly beyond a point and there is wild vegetation. I think the windows are rounded. Inside it is very simple: I only see dark wooden benches, for the moment I don’t see any kind of image, not even a cross. Maybe some flowers.
I tried to find out more about the wedding, what happened with it. The image of the Cardiff’s church comes to mind, and the word “Presbyterian”. I think I was raised in that religion, but I don’t feel very identified with it. I don’t want to marry there. I like much more the white chapel where Jan’s fellow countrymen go, it is much more luminous. The vault (or ceiling, I don’t know if it’s quadrangular or a vault as such), is lower and the chapel much smaller, but it conveys a much warmer sense. I see myself arriving to the altar of that chapel, accompanied by Jan, who is wearing a black cloak and is so handsome. We talk with a parish priest. The priest looks at me strangely. I don’t get to see the wedding. I sense there’s some kind of problem, I don’t know if it’s our different nationality, or our different religion... I don’t know, I think there is something that prevents us from doing it, and it’s not only the fact Jan wasn’t too eager to do it. Or perhaps it has something to do with my reputation in the town: I am a woman who lives on her own, everyone knows of my relationship “in sin” with Jan, and I don’t know where the matter of the abortion was, but maybe there are even rumors about that. It’s not that it matters too much to me, but it was my wish.
Doubts remained there for a while (a couple of years). I found a Facebook group where old pictures of Cardiff are posted, and I joined hoping I would find something meaningful for me, or someone who could ask my question or even validate some of my memories, if it got to that. One day someone uploaded a photograph and I was paralyzed. There it was. The chapel. With its low wall around, the same construction, the white walls... I haven’t yet verified if the sea can be seen from there, or if there’s a railing nearby with beautiful views of the bay, but I have no doubt that was the chapel I knew.
Despite I already had a great experience with past life validations, finding that picture caused me an indescribable feeling. I think in very few occasions I’ve felt anything similar. It’s the absolute certainty of having been there. It’s the incredible satisfaction of knowing your memories are real. And at the same time you know that chapel is not there anymore. Although I want to, I can’t go to Cardiff and see it again with all its colors and splendor. The bitter side of memories is becoming aware everything is ephemeral. Time destroys everything in the end. As says a song by Marillion, the only thing you have left are echoes of what you lived and felt.
PS: If someone can tell me something more about that chapel, whatever, I will be forever grateful.