2 March
Chad, Bishop of Lichfield, Missionary, 672
Chad, Bishop of Lichfield, is perhaps best known for NOT being
Archbishop of York. He was elected and duly installed, but various
persons raised objections, and rather than cause division in the
Church he withdrew. (The objection was that some of the bishops who
had consecrated him--although not Chad himself--were holdouts who,
even after the Synod of Whitby had supposedly settled the question
in 663, insisted on preserving Celtic customs on the date of
celebrating Easter and similar questions, instead of conforming to
the customs of the remainder of Western Christendom.) He was soon
after made Bishop of Lichfield in Mercia. He served there for only
two and a half years before his death, but he made a deep
impression. In the following decades, many chapels, and many wells,
were constructed in Mercia and named for him. (It was an old custom
to dig a well where one was needed, and to mark it with one's own
name or another's, that thirsty travellers and others might drink
and remember the name with gratitude.)