Trinity Church chapel-of-ease in City of Hamilton, Bermuda 1879

A chapel of ease (or chapel-of-ease) is a

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * Chris ...

building other than the

parish church A parish church (or parochial church) in Christianity is the church which acts as the religious centre of a parish. In many parts of the world, especially in rural areas, the parish church may play a significant role in community activities ...

, built within the bounds of a

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest, often termed a parish priest, who might be assisted by one or ...

for the attendance of those who cannot reach the parish church conveniently. Often a chapel of ease is deliberately built as such, being more accessible to some parishioners than the main church. Such a

chapel A chapel is a Christian place of prayer and worship that is usually relatively small. The term has several meanings. Firstly, smaller spaces inside a church that have their own altar are often called chapels; the Lady chapel is a common type ...

may exist, for example, when a parish covers several dispersed

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to ...

s, or a central village together with its satellite

hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a Shakespearean tragedy, tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Den ...

or hamlets. In such a case the parish church will be in the main settlement, with one or more chapels of ease in the subordinate village(s) and/or hamlet(s). An example is the chapel belonging to All Hallows' Parish in

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to it ...

, US; the chapel was built in Davidsonville from 1860 to 1865 because the parish's "Brick Church" in South River was too far away at distant. A more extreme example is the Chapel-of-Ease built in 1818 on St. David's Island in

Bermuda ) , anthem = "God Save the King" , song_type = National song , song = " Hail to Bermuda" , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , mapsize2 = , map_caption2 = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = , e ...

to spare St. David's Islanders crossing St. George's Harbour to reach the parish church, St. Peter's, on St. George's Island. Some chapels of ease are buildings which used to be the main parish church until a larger building was constructed for that purpose. For example, the small village of

Norton, Hertfordshire Norton is a small village and former civil parish in Hertfordshire, England, one of the three original villages which were absorbed into Letchworth Garden City, the other two being Willian and Old Letchworth. The village is known to have existed ...

, contains the mediaeval church of St Nicholas, which served it adequately for centuries; but when the large new town of

Letchworth Letchworth Garden City, commonly known as Letchworth, is a town in the North Hertfordshire district of Hertfordshire, England. It is noted for being the first garden city. The population at the time of the 2011 census was 33,249. Letchworth ...

was built, partly within the parish, St Nicholas's became too small to serve the increased population. This led to the building of a new main church building for the parish, and St Nicholas's became a chapel of ease.

Chapels of ease are sometimes associated with large

manor house A manor house was historically the main residence of the lord of the manor. The house formed the administrative centre of a manor in the European feudal system; within its great hall were held the lord's manorial courts, communal meals with ...

s, where they provide a convenient place of worship for the family of the manor, and for the domestic and rural staff of the house and the estate. There are many such chapels in England, for example that at Pedlinge in

Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces the ...

. An example in the

New World The term ''New World'' is often used to mean the majority of Earth's Western Hemisphere, specifically the Americas."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: Oxford University Press, p. 3 ...

is Saint John's Chapel of Ease in

Chamcook, New Brunswick Chamcook ( ) is an unincorporated area in Charlotte County, New Brunswick, Canada. It lies between the eastern bank of Chamcook Lake and the western edge of Passamaquoddy Bay. Local governance is provided by the Chamcook Local Service Distri ...

, Canada, which was built in the 1840s to support a gentleman's house and the small settlement of shipbuilders, farmers, and grist-mill nearby. Sometimes an ancient parish church is reduced in status to a chapel of ease due to a shift of population. The churches of St Mary Wiston and All Saints' at

Buncton Buncton () is a small village in the Horsham District of West Sussex, England, part of the civil parish of Wiston north. It lies to the east of the A24 road, as the crow flies, about by road south of Horsham and north west of Shoreham by S ...

West Sussex West Sussex is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the shire districts of Adur, Arun, Chichester, Horsham, and Mid Sussex, and the boroughs of Crawley and Worthing. Covering an ar ...

are an example of this. For centuries St Mary's was the parish church (located near to

Wiston House Wiston House is a 16th-century Grade I listed building set in the South Downs National Park on the south coast of England, surrounded by over of parkland in Wiston, West Sussex. It is the home of Wilton Park, an executive agency of the Foreign a ...

and therefore the centre of population), whilst All Saints' served the nearby hamlet of Buncton, as a chapel of ease. Today, however, the resident population of Wiston is tiny, whilst Buncton has grown, so that in 2007 the status of the buildings was reversed, with All Saints' becoming the parish church, and St Mary's reduced to a chapel of ease. When two or more existing parishes are combined into a single parish, one or more of the old church buildings may be kept as a chapel of ease. For example, the six Roman Catholic parishes in

Palo Alto, California Palo Alto (; Spanish for "tall stick") is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. The city was esta ...

, were combined into a single parish, St. Thomas Aquinas Parish in 1987. Since then, St. Thomas Aquinas Church serves as the parish church, with Our Lady of the Rosary Church and St. Albert the Great Church as chapels of ease. When a parish is split because of expanding population a chapel of ease may be promoted to a full parish church. An example of this is St. Margaret's Church, Rochester in Kent which started as a chapel of ease for the parish of St Nicholas in 1108, became a parish church in 1488 then reverted to a chapel of ease when the parish was recombined with St Peter's in 1953.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Chapel Of Ease ease no:Kirke#Annekskirker

See also

References