Chapel Report
The Chapel has been abuzz with activity and excitement this year.
Our Sunday Evensong services have continued to combine exquisite music (courtesy of our outstanding Choir and Director of Music) with the opportunity for deep spiritual reflection.
In Michaelmas Term, our visiting speakers took their cue from the Table at the east end of Chapel, which bears the inscription, Nobiscum Deus, ‘God with us’. This alludes to the great prophecy of the coming of Christ recorded in Isaiah 7:14: ‘The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel’ (which means, ‘God with us’). With this in mind, our preachers explored how God might help to make sense of the complexities of our lives, studies and experiences. This included Professor Russell Cowburn speaking on God and Science, the Bishop of Guildford on God and Music, Professor Richard Bauckham on God and Suffering, Dr Andrew Byers on God and History, and Dr Mandy Maxwell on God and Art. In Lent Term, our sermon theme was ‘Encountering God’, examining how stories of divine encounter from the Bible reveal surprising truths about God’s identity and ours. We really rich reflections from (among others) Professor Simeon Zahl, Dr Olga Fabrikant-Burke, and Clare Bye-Fellow Peter Judd. For Easter Term, Graham and I put together a special series of addresses on ‘Faith in Music’, with preachers showing how a particular piece of choral music (sung by the Choir at the service) points to the beauty of the transcendent God, and the redeeming love of Christ.
Chapel Wardens after advent service
Chapel Wardens after advent service
This included sermons from Dr Dominic White O.P., Professor Ben Quash, Professor David Rowland, and former Clare Organ Scholar George Gillow, and proved to be a wonderful way of opening up the fruitful dialogue between music and worship in our services.
To read more about Clare Choir, click here.
A simple list of titles and speakers, however, can’t convey the real sense of personal engagement among those attending services each week, which I’ve found especially striking this year. Chapel is providing a very valuable space for deep enquiry and spiritual searching among a wide range of students (not to mention staff, Fellows and visitors). What we seek to do in Chapel, week in and week out, is to set this serious thinking within a context of friendliness, warmth of welcome to all, and generous hospitality (food and drink!) – and I’m really encouraged by the fruit that is being borne. This quality of engagement is seen not only in the big Evensong services, but in the quieter moments too: the simple Sunday morning Holy Communion services, the evening discussion groups about faith, the preparation of students for baptism or Confirmation. In all this, I’m hugely grateful to our tremendously enthusiastic team of student Chapel Wardens, and to our large and growing group of Chapel readers, who bring so much collegiality and good cheer to our services. I’m very thankful, too, to our new Decani Scholar, Alex Macdonald. Alex is a Theology PhD student at Clare, and is also a recently ordained Anglican clergyman. He has been an extraordinarily thoughtful, kind and committed member of our Chapel team.
Each year, I aim to try out some fresh Chapel services and events, alongside our familiar favourites such as the ever-popular Advent Carol Services and the late-night Complines. For Remembrance Sunday, we marked the centenary of the opening of Memorial Court, built to remember the Clare men who had given their lives in the First World War, with a special service. We began by re-creating the original opening ceremony from November 1924, with the College community (and many alumni) gathering at the Memorial Court archway, as the Choir sang the Psalm and Anthem, and as we observed the 11 o’clock silence. The College’s wreath was laid by Brian Yates, himself a Clare alumnus, who wore the blazer of his great uncle, Leslie Brooks, who came up to Clare in 1911, and died in 1915 bravely leading his men during the Battle of Loos. We then processed down the Avenue, singing the ‘Old Hundredth’, and continued with our act of remembrance in Chapel. In February, we put on a special service of music and readings for Candlemas, sung by the Choir by candlelight. This was a very moving occasion, as we pondered the aged Simeon cradling the Christ child in his arms, and recognising the long-awaited one who would be ‘the light to lighten’ the world. We concluded Lent Term with a liturgical performance of James MacMillan’s Seven Last Words from the Cross for Passiontide – a service which brought home to us the love of Christ, and left, for many, a profound impression.
Chapel life is not, of course, confined to the Chapel building. This year there have been Tuesday Teas in the Fellows’ Garden for students needing a break from revision, Dean’s Port evening socials, a lovely trip to the Old Library of St John’s College for Clare students and staff, and a Saturday retreat to Little Gidding, for some Ferrar-inspired fresh air, countryside walks, and a rendition of Four Quartets. We’ve also hosted visiting groups throughout the year, including a group of sixth form students visiting from Bermondsey (connected to the Salmon Youth Centre, a charity with historic links to Clare), and members of the congregation of St Peter’s Church, Warmfield (near Pontefract), which is a Clare parish living. We also had a wonderful time visiting St Mary’s Church, Rotherhithe (another Clare living) in December, and singing a special Advent Carol Service to raise money for Bede House. Friends from Clare Hall, Fisher House, and Great Gransden have joined us for special services at various points during the academic year, and we continue to run termly joint Communion services with Trinity Hall (with a free cooked breakfast thrown in!). In addition to music performances and rehearsals, it’s been really encouraging to open up the Chapel space to lots of other inspiring student projects this term, including poetry writing and reading evenings organised by the Clare Literary Society, and a research project on faith experiences among students of global majority heritage.
Choral services run on Tuesdays (6.15pm), Thursdays (6.15pm) and Sundays (6pm, followed by drinks and dinner) every week during Term, and the Chapel Termcard can be found on the Clare website (under ‘Chapel & Choir’). All Clare alumni are always warmly invited to join us for any of our services – it would be a great joy to meet you, and to welcome you to Chapel.
Built with Shorthand