St Edward's, 150 Years

St Edward’s: 150 Years

Left,farleftandbelow: The restoration of the weathervane in 2012. Bottom: Chapel in the Quad, Revd Shaw preaching, May 2013.

Wippell, comes over from St Nicholas, Islip, where he is now vicar, to perform services for OSE. The present Chaplain, Revd Charlie Kerr, and Assistant Chaplain, Revd Tom Shaw, provide many thought-provoking themed services each term and congregations are certainly participatory. The service in Christ

Church Cathedral, held at 8pm on Friday 22 March 2013, was a wonderful celebration of the 150 years of the School, with the involvement of OSE, teachers and pupils. It was accompanied by exceptional singing and very moving music. Simeon would indeed find much to applaud.

died in the war. In the 1950s most of the original pelicans and angels which had headed the standards (bench ends) dividing the chancel from the rest of the Chapel were removed, together with the two innermost panels of chancel rails on each side of the Chancel and the two original brass lecterns. In the mid- 1970s the altar was once again changed by removing pews so that the celebrant could be seen by the congregation during Communion, and this allowed the altar to be used on three sides ‘to express our fellowship more easily’ (Chaplain J.J. Fielding). In 1994 the Lower and Upper Chamber classrooms were built for Religious Studies and a space was retained for the choir’s robing. The building was opened and consecrated by the Bishop of Oxford in March 1995 and included the rescue and reinstatement of the old vestry door as the entrance to the Lower Chamber. Removed in 1931, it had been neglected in various ways, which included being used as a bridge over a ditch in the School grounds. On the south side of the Chapel are buried Warden Simeon and his wife. This is also where Warden Fisher’s ashes were placed, and directly behind the War Memorial there is the grave of the longest-serving of all teachers in the School’s 150 years, Wilfrid Cowell. If Simeon could see how the Chapel is used now he would doubtless be horrified by the small number of services compared with his own day, but he might nevertheless be pleased to see that the Chapel is still at the heart of the School, with fantastic choirs, separate Quad and Field-side services allowing the huge increase in numbers since his day to be accommodated, all supported by enthusiastic sacristans and bell-ringers – of both sexes! A former Chaplain, Revd David

THE CHAPLAIN

When we have a weekly Compline at School here on a Thursday night, we sing ancient chants to Gregorian Plainsong and we regularly have between ten and 20 attending. Some come for the space, some for the prayer and worship, some because they are struggling in some way or a relative is ill. It is always a holy space and a place of grace. I am always slightly surprised by the amount of positive feedback that such an ancient service generates. It seems young people increasingly are seeking for, and responding to,invitationstopeaceandstillnessanddepth;themoresuperficial, instant and immediate our world becomes, themore they seem to need ‘the peace of God which passes all understanding.’ Inwhat sometimes feels like an increasingly secular society in England,theplaceoffaithschools,orthoseschoolswhichtreasure their rich Christian heritage, is frequently questioned. Should a school promulgate an opinion of perceived truth in a plural society? In many ways I am in sympathy with this view; we must be sensitive to the diversity and wealth of different cultures and faiths, we must attend to the individual and not seek to impose a blueprint of spiritual orthodoxy on young minds and souls. Yet I find I also want to say that the Christian faith, in all its refracted splendour, is a deep well and endless resource by which we can all be resourced and renewed as human beings. In our current culturally sensitive climate we are in danger of throwing out the babywiththebathwater;ouryoungpeoplearegrowingsouls,and if wewish themtodomore than simply default unwittingly to the current norms and values of the age then we must expose them

to the full panoply of our spiritual tradition. As G.K. Chesterton once said,‘When people stop believing inGod, they don’t believe in nothing, they believe in anything.’ I think I would rather our children were given the opportunity of faith, even if they choose not to take it. – The Chaplain, Revd Charlie Kerr

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