God brought me back from the brink

Twice divorced and twice driven to the brink of suicide, 63-year-old Katherine Rhydderch can now testify with conviction that God has never left her side.

Today she lives in the peaceful village of Henry Gwyn, West Carmarthenshire, and worships at Bethesda Baptist Chapel in nearby Narberth – but her journey to faith has been anything but easy.

Born in Pembrokeshire weighing just one-and-a-half pounds, Katherine’s life began against all odds. Her childhood, however, was marked by cruelty. “Childhood was constant mental torture with my mother’s fuse forever blowing,” she recalled. “When I passed my piano exam without distinction, she set fire to the certificate. She was brutal.”

Starved of affection, Katherine searched for love elsewhere. By the age of 16, still naïve about life, she found herself pregnant. Under pressure, she aborted twin boys – a decision that haunted her. She married the father soon after, but his repeated infidelity ended the marriage, though not before the birth of her first son.

A second marriage brought another boy, but her new husband turned out to be a drug-runner. Broken and despairing, Katherine twice attempted to take her own life. Both times, she says, God intervened. “It’s clear to me now that He saved me for a reason,” she said quietly.

Raised in the Catholic faith, Katherine had long admired its beauty and ritual but yearned for something more personal. That encounter came when she accepted a friend’s invitation to a Baptist chapel.

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