Richard of Chichester - Shrine

Shrine

It was generally believed that miracles were wrought at Richard's tomb in Chichester cathedral, which was long a popular place of pilgrimage, and in 1262 he was canonized at Viterbo by Pope Urban IV.

His feast day is on 3 April in the West, but because this date generally falls within Lent or Eastertide this is normally translated to 16 June in the Anglican Communion, which venerates St. Richard more widely than does the Roman Catholic Church. Richard furnished the chronicler, Matthew Paris, with material for the life of St. Edmund Rich, and instituted the offerings for the cathedral at Chichester which were known later as "St. Richard's pence."

During the episcopate of the first Anglican bishop of Chichester, Richard Sampson, King Henry VIII of England, through his Vicar-General, Thomas Cromwell ordered the destruction of the Shrine of St. Richard in Chichester cathedral in 1538.

Forasmuch as we have lately been informed that in our cathedral church of Chichester there hath been used long heretofore, and yet at this day is used, much superstition and a certain kind of idolatry about the shrine and bones of a certain bishop of the same, whom they call Saint Richard, and a certain resort there of common people, which being men of simplicity are seduced by the instigation of some of the clergy, who take advantage of their credulity to ascribe miracles of healing and other virtues to the said bones, that God only hath authority to grant. . . . . We have appointed you, with all convenient diligence to repair unto the said cathedral church, and to take away the shrine and bones of that bishop called Saint Richard, with all ornaments to the said shrine belonging, and all other the reliques and reliquaries, the silver, the gold, and all the jewels belonging to said shrine, and that not only shall you see them to be safely and surely conveyed unto our Tower of London there to be bestowed and placed at your arrival, but also ye shall see both the place where the shrine was kept, destroyed even to the ground and all such other images of the said church ,where about any notable superstition is used, to be carried and conveyed away, so that our subjects shall by them in no ways be deceived hereafter, but that they,pay to Almighty God and to no earthly creature such honour as is due unto him the Creator. . . . . Given under our privy seal at our manor of Hampton Court, the 14th day of Dec., in the 30th year of our reign (1538).

The document ordering the destruction of the shrine was issued to a Sir William Goring of Burton and a William Ernley. They received £40 for carrying out the commission on 20 December 1538.

The Shrine of St. Richard had, up to this point, enjoyed a level of popularity approaching that accorded to Thomas Becket at Canterbury. It seems that someone associated with the parish of West Wittering in Sussex, possibly William Ernley, using his position as royal commissioner for the destruction of St. Richard's Shrine, may have spirited away the relics and bones of St. Richard and hidden them in their own parish church, as there are persistent legends of the presence there, of the remains of the saint:

The Lady Chapel not only contains the Saxon Cross but also an ancient broken marble slab engraved with a Bishop's pastoral staff and a Greek cross believed to have come from a reliquary containing the relics of St. Richard of Chichester, a 13th century bishop who often visited West Wittering. Part of his story is shown in the beautiful red, white and gold altar frontal presented by Yvonne Rusbridge in 1976. On the left St Richard is shown feeding the hungry in Cakeham and on the right leading his followers from the church, his candle miraculously alight despite the gust of wind which blew out all the other candles.

The modern St Richard's Shrine is located in the retro-quire of Chichester cathedral and was re-established in 1930 by Dean Duncan Jones. In 1987 during the restoration of the Abbey of La Lucerne, in Normandy, the lower part of a man's arm was discovered in a reliquary, the relic was thought to be Richard's. After examination, to establish its provenance, the relic was offered to Bishop Eric Kemp and received into the cathedral on 15 June 1990. The relic was buried in 1991 below the St Richard altar. A further relic, together with an authentication certificate, was offered from Rome at the same time and is now housed at the bishops chapel in Chichester. The modern shrine of Richard contains an altar that was designed by Robert Potter, a tapestry designed by John Piper and an icon designed by Sergei Fyodorov that shows St Richard in episcopal vestments, his hand raised in blessing towards the viewer, but also in supplication to the figure of Christ who appears to him from heaven .