Friends Of Arundel Cathedral - Cornerstone Spring 2022

FRIENDS of ARUNDEL CATHEDRAL

Spring 2022

A strikingly austere portrait of Anne Dacre in old age, by Wenceslaus Hollar, an artist from Bohemia who had come to England under the patronage of Anne’s son Thomas, the ‘Collector Earl’.

‘For both the attire of her head, in her ruffs, gowns, and all other things, she kept so constantly the same fashion, the same colour, the same stuff, that it was hard even for those who lived in the house to perceive when she made any change, the new being so like the old.’

Dear Friends

When Duke Henry built the Cathedral (then of course simply a parish church) devotion to the relics of saints was largely a thing of the past. While Henry was enthusiastic about filling the church with sculpted and stained-glass images of saints of every variety, he does not appear to have felt the need to include physical mementos of their lives. But he would surely have been hugely gratified to know that the mortal remains of his most illustrious ancestor, St Philip Howard, would one day be held in the church, beneath the saint’s own altar.

The fact that his remains came to Arundel at all – indeed the fact that Philip’s life evolved as it did, is due to the remarkable woman who was his wife, Anne Dacre. In this issue of Cornerstone we take the opportunity to give some detail of a life too often regarded as marginal. She is among those commemorated each year in masses in the Fitzalan Chapel; hers was celebrated this Easter Tuesday. Some would contend that she is as worthy an example of sainthood as her husband, and in that spirit we picture the empty niche, on the cover, as waiting for her arrival!

This issue also includes Margaret Bamford’s report on the Friends’ pilgrimage in September. With the restrictions of lockdown gradually diminishing the Cathedral has been able to host a variety of events during the past few months. Solemn Vespers hosted by the Friends marked the beginning of Advent, with local dignitaries in attendance and heavy snow falling outside; Worthing Deanery schools were welcomed for their Advent service, and Canine Partners for their service for friends and supporters. Throughout the Advent season our seminarian Eddie Hopkins co-ordinated the main Synod Group and feedback to the Diocese, as well as recruiting and training new readers for the Parish. Lent Groups and Stations of the Cross have been conducted jointly with our Anglican friends at St Nicholas. Prayers with Bishop Richard continue each week for peace in the Ukraine.

Sadly, at the time of writing those prayers must continue unabated.

Oliver Hawkins Editor

ANNE DACRE, COUNTESS OF ARUNDEL

Anne was born in 1557 in Carlisle. Her mother having died in childbirth, Anne was brought up by a Catholic grandmother, doubtless the influence that led to her own conversion to Catholicism at the age of twenty five, in Arundel Castle. At twelve a marriage had been arranged between her and Philip Howard, Earl of Arundel, formalised two years later when the couple reached the age of consent. Anne’s conversion led to her being put under house arrest by Queen Elizabeth, but this did nothing to diminish her efforts to persuade her husband to join her in the faith. Philip had effectively abandoned his wife for the high-life of Elizabeth’s Court, and must have seemed an unlikely convert, but his experience of witnessing the trial of the Jesuit priest Edmund Campion so impressed him that he made the decision to risk the Queen’s ire by joining the Catholic Church.

For Elizabeth this was a betrayal. In 1570, at a time when her throne was genuinely under threat, Pope Pious V had excommunicated the Queen, and instructed English Catholics not to recognise her sovereignty. Philip’s conversion therefore made him a suspect in her eyes, and Anne the agent of his betrayal. Philip was imprisoned in the Tower of London, Anne banished from London, their titles and properties forfeit. It was in rented rooms in Essex that their son Thomas was born, and for eleven years until Philip’s death in 1595 Anne was forbidden any kind of visit to her increasingly frail husband.

The pair of windows at the west end of the Cathedral, depicting St Philip and Anne, were installed in 1986 in memory of George Vigar. The windows were designed by John Lawson (1932-2009), chief artist for the internationally renowned Goddard & Gibbs Studios, London, adding to the Cathedral’s fine collection of stained-glass.

Anne, opposite, is shown in her usual widow’s black, but with an ornate decoration on her breast, the significance of which is uncertain. In her hand she holds the scroll of the foundation of the Jesuit House in Ghent (now part of the University of Ghent), which she helped to establish.

Anne must have been a resourceful character as well as being a deeply pious woman, and with the death of Elizabeth in 1603 and the accession of King James she was able gradually to reclaim her possessions, and restore her place in society, at the same time as practising her Catholic faith. As well as her rigorous daily religious observances she wrote extensively, memoirs and poetry (now little read beyond the confines of American university libraries), and her finances must have become increasingly sound for her to carry out the good works for which she became renowned:

‘Her charity and alms-deeds were unfailing: she nursed the sick, rescued orphans, provided poor girls with their marriage portions; no one in need ever called her in vain. Twenty poor people were fed daily from her house, and on three days a week near a hundred came from the villages around to share the dinner specially prepared for them. Her love of little children increased with her old age and she took much delight in making simple feasts for them’.

Despite her personal austerity, Anne’s household sounds cheerful, and there are delightful descriptions of her, even when ill in bed, handing out pieces of cake to poor children. By the end of her life she had fully recovered her status, if not her titles, and in her final illness Charles I ‘sent constantly to enquire for her, and told a friend that he prayed every day for her health and welfare’. She died in 1630, having outlived her husband by thirty five years.

THE REMAINS OF ST PHILIP HOWARD

In 1623, twenty eight years after Philip’s death, Anne was able to have his remains transferred from his father’s tomb in London to the Fitzalan Chapel in Arundel. In the inscription on his iron coffin she had written ‘The venerated remains of Philip, Earl of Arundel and Surrey, were deposited in this chest by the care of his well-beloved wife Anne, when, by the signal piety of his son Thomas, permission was obtained from King James.’

The ‘signal piety of his son Thomas’ was wishful thinking; Anne was devastated by Thomas’s cavalier attitude towards his faith, and the cheerfulness with which he abandoned it to further his political career. But the remains of Arundel’s saint were in safe keeping, in the Fitzalan Chapel at the time of Philip’s beatification in 1929, and moved to Arundel Cathedral following his canonisation in 1970 and the re-dedication of the Cathedral in his name.

THE FRIENDS ANNUAL PILGRIMAGE, SEPTEMBER 2021

A report by Margaret Bamford

(as first published in The Proclaimer, the Cathedral Parish’s online magazine)

Celebrating their return to active communion with the Diocese, The Friends’ long delayed, and much looked forward to, pilgrimage in and around Arundel took place at the end of September. Participants came from all over the Diocese – over 30 in all. Representing a wide diversity of interests and experience, many commented on how good it was to be back together meeting people, sharing an appreciation of their common faith, and re-visiting the well- trodden path of hundreds of years of previous generations of pilgrims.

From the remains of the Calceto Priory, formerly a small house for Augustinian Canons established in the 12 Century, and now a small farmhouse close to Arundel railway station, the pilgrims walked to the remains of the Dominican Friary close to the bridge over the river before moving on to the Church of St Nicholas, the Fitzalan Chapel, the Lady Chapel and then into the Castle grounds past the site of the Chapel of St Mary, a Marian shrine established in 1415, to the Mary Gate, and concluding at the Cathedral. At each stop the historical and spiritual importance of the sites were described by respected and knowledgeable pilgrims. The richness of our heritage and its spiritual significance were emphasised powerfully by their contributions. Relevant prayers and choral praise made for truly memorable experiences.

The event was especially significant for its emphasis on ecumenism. While it was a Roman initiative the Anglican community at St Nicholas - friends and clergy –welcomed their visitors not only with warmth and friendship but with erudite accounts of how specialist researches had enhanced the knowledge and history of the building. Of particular interest was the genuine illuminating graffiti from the middle ages and even before; not easily visible head on but with an angled torch very plainly identifiable. Fascinating! Moving forward 800 years Canon David Twinley from St Nicholas introduced the parish’s latest acquisition – a specially commissioned icon in the Lady Chapel. Previously, said Canon David ‘there had been a large Taize cross behind the altar, followed by a tapestry of The Burning Bush neither of which was quite right ….’, it was agreed that what was needed was a piece of artwork ….. ‘designed specifically for the space’ and being clearly designed for the Lady Chapel’.

What is now there is the most beautiful of icons. Arriving in Arundel in June, at the end of August it was blessed and dedicated to the memory of Canon Brian Cook, a retired much loved priest who died last year. Canon David told the fascinated pilgrims that, ‘our new Curate Dominik knew a talented iconographer, Barbara Klimczuk-Moczulska, a Russian Orthodox iconographer working from a studio in Poland. She was commissioned to bring a sense of identity light and sanctity to the Lady Chapel’. ‘At its heart is the Virgin Mary and the Christ Child. On the left is the patron saint of the Diocese of Chichester, St Richard, holding a scroll with his famous prayer ‘Thanks be to thee ...’ This choice was appropriate, not only because of the diocesan connection, but also because there are numerous inscriptions in the church inscribed by medieval pilgrims to his shrine.

On the right is St Nicholas holding an image of the church. ‘Two angels are also depicted holding a cloth behind Our Lady’ …’picking up a detail in the medieval wall painting of the Coronation of Mary in the north aisle in which two angels hold up Mary’s coronation gown’.

From St Nicholas the pilgrims moved to the glorious Cathedral towering in magisterial glory above the Arun Valley. The Friends of the Cathedral have published a detailed guide, written by the knowledgeable Oliver Hawkins freely available to all pilgrims; and offering a structured approach to appreciating all that this magnificent building had to offer.

Finishing in the Cathedral Centre with a cup of tea and cake with informal chat it was clear that the day had been informative, enjoyable and above all a truly spiritual experience.

Opposite; the pilgrim group in the Fitzalan Chapel, by the monument to Duke Henry, founder of Arundel Cathedral. The remains of Anne Dacre are in a vault below the Lady Chapel.