Spiritual values

"That chapel sits in grand isolation, but on a Sunday you'd see little parties coming from the various farms and I remember when that chapel was always full of folk. The front pew would be covered with carry-cots and the old men, for some mysterious reason, went to the back. That's where I was heckled on one occasion." An elderly member of the congregation accused him of telling fairy tales. The heckler, along with Keasden and a host other vibrant Methodist chapels across Yorkshire, are now history.

In his 40 years as a lay preacher Bill Mitchell watched as Methodism ceased to be the central thread holding together Dales communities.

"The composition of Dales villages is quite radically different to what it used to be," says Bill. "It used to be very much a local thing with generations of families associated with specific buildings and farming. Now the number of native folk has gone down and the 'off-comers' have gone up. It changed attitudes."

Ian Searjent, the national conservation officer for the Methodist Church, says: "There were a number of chapels in Swaledale. Now there are two, one at Reeth and one at Gunnerside where there was a scheme about 12 years ago to take out the pews and allow the school to make more use of it. They use it for assemblies and for activities. That's

often the key to keeping buildings in use, even if the function as a place of worship is diminished."

In the northern part of the Yorkshire Dales, the growth of Methodism often went hand-in-hand with the lead mining industry, where there was a strong emphasis on pulling together .

Many chapels in Yorkshire date back to the early days of Methodism and it is some of these which are facing the biggest challenges. One example is Mount Zion on the edge of Ogden Moor, near Halifax. "The most famous event at the chapel was in 1790 when John Wesley paid his final visit to West Yorkshire and he preached at the chapel," says Dr John Hargreaves, a lay preacher and general secretary of the Wesley Historical Society. "There was a vast congregation. This was within a year of Wesley's death."

Dr Hargreaves has regularly taken services at this remarkable building. Despite its isolation, Mount Zion prospered in the early part of the 19th century and was re-built. Today, the fabric is sound. It's the worshippers who have crumbled away.

"There has been a sharp decline among young people, the congregation has aged and dwindled," says Dr Hargreaves. "The last service I took, it was a congregation of 10. "

From September, the weekly services are being cut to six a year and religion will cease to be the sole reason for its existence. The site has been identified as a site for Methodist Heritage. Ian Searjent says it's easier for them than for the Church of England to investigate new uses because the buildings are not consecrated. Having Mount Zion as a heritage centre available for occasional worship looks like an ideal outcome.

The 1689 Act of Toleration gave dissenters – Baptists, Congregationalists and the rest – leave to set up and build their own churches. The Quakers wasted no time. Construction of a meeting house in the corner of a field at Farfield near the village of Addingham in Wharfedale began on September 1, 1689, the date the Act came into force.

It became redundant early, in 1820. After the Second World War it was bought by a group of prominent Quakers in London and in the early 1990s they gave the building to the newly formed Historic Chapels Trust.

Another one of the chapels now being rescued by the trust is at Wainsgate above Hebden Bridge. It is listed Grade Two Star and although still a work in progress, it is already popular as a music venue. "The moment you go there you just get captivated," says David Nelson, music director of Hebden Bridge Arts Festival. "It's in the most extraordinary place, down a track, up a mountain effectively – just an extraordinarily beautiful place on the edge of the moors. Inside everything is marble and teak and it has the most amazing acoustic."

The trust has been given a grant by English Heritage to restore the building, and is looking for another 25,000 of match funding.

At nearby Heptonstall, an octagonal chapel is one of the oldest Methodist chapels in continuous use in the world. John Wesley laid the foundation stone in 1764 and it is in good condition.

Bill Mitchell's big regret is not the loss of the buildings he once preached in, but the people who used them. "You can't think in terms of little individual chapels, but of an overall social change.

"One just hopes that at some particular stage people will just get absolutely fed up of a humdrum materialistic life and in a general way swing back to spiritual values. "