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

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a place/building for Christian religious activities and praying * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian comm ...

building other than the

parish church A parish church (or parochial church) in Christianity is the Church (building), 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 com ...

, built within the bounds of a

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christianity, Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest#Christianity, priest, often termed a parish pries ...

for the attendance of those who cannot reach the parish church conveniently, generally due to travel distance. 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 (from , a diminutive of ''cappa'', meaning "little cape") is a Christianity, Christian place of prayer and worship that is usually relatively small. The term has several meanings. First, smaller spaces inside a church that have their o ...

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

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

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. Set in Denmark, the play (the ...

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 U.S. state, state in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It borders the states of Virginia to its south, West Virginia to its west, Pennsylvania to its north, and Delaware to its east ...

, United States. The chapel was built in

Davidsonville Davidsonville is an unincorporated community in central Anne Arundel County, Maryland, United States. It is a semi-rural community composed mostly of farms and suburban-like developments and is a good example of an "exurb." Davidsonville has rel ...

from 1860 to 1865 because the parish's "Brick Church" in South River was distance which took an hour to walk each way. A more extreme example is the Chapel-of-Ease built in 1818 on St. David's Island in

Bermuda Bermuda is a British Overseas Territories, British Overseas Territory in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean. The closest land outside the territory is in the American state of North Carolina, about to the west-northwest. Bermuda is an ...

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, contains the mediaeval church of St Nicholas, which served it adequately for centuries, but when the garden city

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 2021 census was 33,990. 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 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 usually held the lord's manorial courts, communal mea ...

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 Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Gr ...

. An example in the

New World The term "New World" is used to describe the majority of lands of Earth's Western Hemisphere, particularly the Americas, and sometimes Oceania."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: ...

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 was provided by the Chamcook Local Service Distr ...

, Canada, which was built in the 1840s to support a gentleman's house and the small nearby settlement of shipbuilders, farmers, and a grist-mill. 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 Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Surrey to the north, East Sussex to the east, the English Channel to the south, and Hampshire to the west. The largest settlement is Cr ...

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 ...

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 language, Spanish for ) is a charter city in northwestern Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a Sequoia sempervirens, coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. Th ...

, 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