Our Lady of Pew...

The Chapel of Our Lady of Pew in Westminster is, at 5 foot square, the smallest chapel I have ever seen. Its only rival is in my friend's house, a chapel purpose built by the original owner, a wealthy Anglo-Catholic priest, who I imagine took great comfort in the simple holiness of it.

I first saw the Pew Chapel about ten years ago. A friend of mine was in town and he wanted to see the Shrine of Edward the Confessor. Having enjoyed, on a previous occasion, a very intelligent discussion with the erstwhile Dean about planetis plicatis, and advised by another friend that the chapter of Westminster are very hospitable if you butter them up, I approached the Dean after Evensong and introduced my friend. He was delighted by the request and told us to wait to one side as he bid the congregation good night. Presently he returned and gave us a private tour not only of the Shrine but also of the Lady Chapel, built by Henry VII and described by John Leland as the orbis miraculum. I said a private prayer by the tomb of Mary, Queen of Scots (for whom I have a soft spot), after which our host said "one last thing" and took us down the stairs into the north quire aisle. Just a few feet away from the Confessor Shrine is the Pew Chapel, which you might mistake for a tiny corridor.

Richard II prayed here often before the Wilton Diptych. There is an alabaster statue of the Mother of God in the chapel, a replica of an ancient statue. I can't remember what the Dean said about it, but he bid us look up at the ceiling of the chapel. He described the boss overhead as "a splendid depiction of the Virgin's Assumption into Heaven, miraculously preserved into our time." The Puritans destroyed much of the stained glass and statuary in the Abbey but the Pew Chapel is so tiny that it escaped their reforming zeal!

There is an Anglo-Catholic Society dedicated to this chapel that meets once a year for a Mass in the Abbey. I went to one at the invitation of an old friend Geoffrey Monk, who was also involved with the Society of King Charles the Martyr and the Royal Stuart Society. Never again.

I would like to express my gratitude to Dr John Hall for having shown us around. He did much in his time as Dean to make Westminster Abbey a very welcoming place, and my friend very affectionately told me afterwards that meeting me in the Abbey was the highlight of his trip.