“So the last shall be first, and the first last: for many are called, but few chosen.”

 

Matthew 20:16

 

St Etheldreda

     The Guild Chapel of the Holy Trinity

Æthelthryth was a princess from East Anglia born in 636AD. She was married twice, but throughout both she maintained her virginity. Her first husband was an older man so this was not an issue.

Æthelthryth became a nun soon after her second marriage to someone much younger, but as her husband became a man, he found it more difficult to live a celibate life and tried to force Æthelthryth to have normal relations with him.

She fled to Ely and evaded capture with the help of a miraculous rising of the tide. During this escape, she placed her staff in the ground and lay down to rest. When she awoke, the staff had leaves and branches.

Æthelthryth founded a double monastery in Ely where she was Abbess for seven years, living a life of piety.

She died on 23 June 679AD, principally from a large tumour on her neck. She felt that this was as a result of wearing necklaces during her privileged upbringing. A surgeon examined her after death by making an incision into her neck, and swore that the wound had healed. For this reason, she is patron saint of neck and throat illnesses.

In 695AD Æthelthryth’s body was exhumed and moved from a common grave to a white marble coffin in the new Church at Ely. Her body was found to be uncorrupted, and her old clothes and coffin were said to possess miraculous powers.

In modern times, whilst the chapel is still formally known as the Guild Chapel of the Holy Trinity (after the Guild in Snaith that paid for its upkeep), it is also known locally as the “Gowdall Chapel”. The altar, chairs and the image of Jesus shown on the top left of this banner were all recovered from the original Gowdall Chapel when it was closed in 1965.

Some reports say that these are fragments of the original church