REINSTATE
RECONNECT
RE›SOURCE
We will recreate the shrine of St Chad, our founding bishop and co-patron saint, whose original shrine here was a focus of Christian hope, healing and pilgrimage.
We will look back to the source of Chad’s faith and mission and how it shaped our history and purpose. We will mark the 1350th anniversary of his death in 2022 by reconnecting the Cathedral and the community with Chad’s story and his message. Together with the Lichfield Icons and the statue of St Chad, the shrine will strengthen the Cathedral as a destination for pilgrims and for all those who seek healing.
The new Shrine of St Chad was reinstated in November 2022.
Reinstate
2022 marks 1350 years since the death of our co-patron saint: Saint Chad. It seemed fitting that this should be the year that a shrine is reinstated at Lichfield Cathedral.
St Chad was the first Bishop of Lichfield and a great example of faith. In his short term as Bishop he united warring kingdoms and built a reputation as a humble and devote follower of Jesus. His example was one that early pilgrims to the Cathedral could look to for inspiration.
In mediæval times the shrine of St Chad became one of the most important centres of pilgrimage in the country.
Chad is our inspiration and model in the way he proclaimed and ministered the Gospel.
We pray that the new shrine will become a focus of hope, healing and pilgrimage - pointing a way to prayer and faith in God.
Reconnect
When Lichfield Cathedral was built there was a single, undivided Church - before the Great Schism and the Reformation.
There have been sharp, painful and sometimes violent divisions between the Christian churches over many centuries.
The Cathedral witnessed defacement and destruction in the 16th and 17th centuries. The Shrine of St Chad was destroyed in 1538 and the relics were removed and safeguarded by Catholic families. In the 19th century the surviving relics were housed in St Chad’s Cathedral, Birmingham.
The shrine project seeks to bring us together to remember St Chad, a saint of an undivided Church, whose personal humility and peaceable nature brought many to the Christian faith.
As a mark of the faith we share and the unity that all Christians seek, a relic has been translated back to Lichfield Cathedral. This is a gift of the Archdiocese of Birmingham and the special generosity of St Chad’s Cathedral, Birmingham.
Following centuries of division, violence, destruction in the name of faith the Shrine of St Chad seeks to be a useful focus of worship that will aid Christians from all traditions (Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant). The Cathedral can once again return to providing a place of ecumenical worship and pilgrimage.
Resource
The shrine has been designed as an altar shrine, a place where daily worship is offered and where our attention is brought back to the source of our faith - God.
As its mediæval predecessor, the shrine will serve as a resource for people from all Christian traditions to focus prayers and devotions.
The Shrine aims to focus attention on the example of St Chad. His example, in turn, draws focus to the life and example of Jesus, the only mediator praying on our behalf before God the Father.
We pray that the shrine of St Chad will be a symbol of unity and healing through a shared love of God.
The Saints, or Holy People, who have gone before are worked examples of what it is to be a disciple of Jesus Christ, their example encourages us in our own daily walk
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith…….” (Hebrews 12:1-2)