Ss Mary & Everilda, Everingham

The impressive stuccoed classical exterior almost dwarfs the adjacent red-brick Everingham Hall, which was designed by John Carr and built between 1757 and 1764 for William Haggerston Constable. His descendant, William Constable-Maxwell, 10th Lord Herries of Terregles, from an old recusant family, built the chapel between 1836 and 1839, following passage of the Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829. Once the act was passed, a number of Roman Catholic benefactors offered their assistance, and a large number of churches and chapels were built in the ensuing years. Yorkshire had a long history of recusancy and a large number of families had remained Catholic long after the Reformation, indeed there…

The exterior is unexceptional, but the interior is magnificent, with a long hall flanked with Corinthian columns, and niches with lifesize plaster statues of the Apostles and bas-reliefs of episodes in the life of Christ by Luigi Bozzoni of Carrara. The building is barrel-vaulted, ending in an apse behind the altar, which is of marble inset with panels of polished granite and porphyry. Plenty of 'faux' marbling and real gold leaf adds to the effect, and the acoustics are noteworthy. The organ, by Charles Allen, is contemporary with the chapel, and is on a high west gallery, under the barrel vault. English classical organ Despite the small specification, the organ is laid out grandly and…

The Roman Catholic parish of Everingham was closed in 2004 but the church is still used by the diocese and masses are regularly celebrated in the church. The Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest offered to take over the Church and supply a priest to serve it but this offer was controversially refused by the Bishop of Middlesbrough, John Patrick Crowley, at a time when the diocese was complaining of a shortage of clergy.