The Chapel of St Michael the Archangel
St. Michael is one of the principal angels; his name (which means Who is like God) was the war-cry of the good angels in the battle fought in heaven against the enemy and his followers.
St Michael is the Patron Saint of Soldiers and Swordsmiths, amongst others.
The Chapel at Markenfield, and its connected 600 acre Parish (which has the same boundaries as the estate), is classed as an Ecclesiastical Peculiar – that is, exempt from the Bishop's control (though the house is on excellent terms with him, and he takes an annual service here by invitation).
The Chapel is a Catholic one, at which Anglican services are welcome. In practice the two churches share 50/50, and Services are fortnightly.
Services – July to December 2008
Monday 7th July 6:00pm Holy Communion (BCP) - The Right Reverend and Right Hon. Richard Chartres, Bishop of London
Tuesday 15th July 7:00pm Mass (Tridentine – it is hoped a Missa Cantata with the Latin Mass Society and the Schola Gregoriana of Leeds) - Father Geoffrey Parfitt
Friday 15th August 6:00pm Mass (Assumption of the BVM) - Fr Patrick Waldron
Thursday 21st August 6:00pm Evensong (BCP) - The Rev’d Jim Thom
Saturday 23rd August 11:00am Requiem Mass (Tridentine) for Sir Thomas Markenfield and three other members of the Markenfield family, the last of the family to live here and use this Chapel before being driven in to exile and starvation following The Rising of the North in November 1569 - Father Ronald Creighton-Jobe and sung by the Monks from Ampleforth Abbey
Monday 8th September 6:00pm Mass (Birthday of Our Lady) - Fr Patrick Waldron
Tuesday 30th September 6:00pm Holy Communion - Canon Ronald McFadden
Thursday 2nd October 6:00pm Mass (Feast of St Michael and the Archangels) - Father Patrick Waldron
Thursday 9th October 7:00pm Choral Evensong (BCP) - Canon Paul Greenwell and the choir of St Columba’s Church, Topcliffe
Thursday 6th November 6:00pm Compline, sung by the Lay Clerks of Ripon Cathedral - The Very Reverend Keith Jukes, Dean of Ripon
Thursday 13th November 6:00pm Remembrance Mass - Fr Patrick Waldron
Monday 8th December 8:00pm Christmas at Markenfield, a Service of Lessons and Carols in aid of the Ripon Grammar School Development Fund. (The School was founded by Sir Thomas Markenfield of Markenfield and others in 1555). Conducted by Canon Keith Punshon with the Ebor Singers directed by Dr Paul Gameson. Tickets on sale from 1st November from 01765 602647
Tuesday 9th December 6:00pm Mass of Our Lady - Father Patrick Waldron
OF YOUR CHARITY PRAY FOR THE SOUL OF SIR THOMAS MARKENFIELD, the last of that great family to live at Markenfield before it was confiscated for High Treason and he had to flee in to exile for his life.
He was the main instigator of the Rising of the North in 1569 – The Rising against the Protestant Queen Elizabeth in a vain attempt to restore Catholic freedom of worship to the North.
A large contingent of the Rising gathered in the Courtyard at Markenfield on 20 November 1569, under the leadership of Sir Thomas and the Rising's standard-bearer the venerable Sir Richard Norton (whose portrait now hangs in the Chapel). They last heard Mass in this Chapel before riding out at the head of a large host to Ripon Minster where they overturned the high altar, burned the new Protestant Prayer Books and held a solemn High Mass. It is highly possible that young Sir Thomas, a passionate and devout Catholic, went to the Chantry Chapel of his ancestors during that tumultuous day and prayed for something of their military prowess in the battles that lay ahead.
Alas, the Rising was routed and the lucky ones, including Thomas, managed to flee; over two hundred others were caught and hideously executed. Thomas himself was sentenced in absentia to be hanged, drawn and quartered on capture. He waited for a while in Scotland with the other rebels, but as the net closed round him there, he had to flee again, across the North Sea to the Low Countries where he somehow survived in increasing poverty. In 1576 Cardinal Como wrote to the Bishop of Liege saying that His Holiness had been “moved to compassion by the great indigence to which an English nobleman, Sir Thomas Markenfield, was now reduced” and requesting that he be taken in and looked after by some wealthy monastery.
For whatever reason, this did not happen. And sixteen years later, in August 1592, a papal correspondent, Richard Verstegan, wrote that “Sir Thomas Markenfield has been found dead, lying on the bare floor of his chamber, no creature being resent at his death… He died this last week in Bruxells, in very extreme want and in a most miserable cottage”. Perhaps among his last thoughts were of this, his beloved Chapel at Markenfield and his family Chantry Chapel in Ripon Cathedral, where he too would be resting in peace but for this catastrophe.
A Requiem Tridentine (Latin) Mass will be held for him, and three other members of his family, at 11:00am on Saturday 23 August 2008 to be sung by Monks from Ampleforth Abbey. It will be celebrated by the Rev’d Fr Ronald Creighton-Jobe, Cong. Orat
