Chapel and War Memorials
Despite pupils having multi-faith backgrounds the school adheres to the practices of the Church of England as required of English boarding schools under law. Chapel is taken each week day morning by pupils with a full church service on Sunday following Parade. Consequently cadets go to church services in Chapel wearing their ceremonial uniforms. On days of special religious significance the Chapel follows the traditions of High Church.
The walls of the chapel are laid up with the battle honours belonging to former Cadets' regiments and corps; but of more note are the historic carved marble tablet lists of the thousands of Dukies who have sacrificed their lives in Great Britain's various wars and conflicts since 1803. An inordinately large number of these dead hold decorations for gallantry and distinguished service; and so numerous in quantity that only the most distinguished public schools equal the valourous conduct and distinguished leadership demonstrated by Dukies.
The school has a memorial to the Great War and the Second World War placed just inside of the main entrance to the school. The Parade and Band pays its respects here on the Armistice Commemoration. A great number of former pupils, many of them in the Armed Forces, also attend, along with Dukies who are now Chelsea Pensioners.
Read more about this topic: Duke Of York's Royal Military School
Famous quotes containing the words chapel and, chapel, war and/or memorials:
“The religion of England is part of good-breeding. When you see on the continent the well-dressed Englishman come into his ambassador’s chapel and put his face for silent prayer into his smooth-brushed hat, you cannot help feeling how much national pride prays with him, and the religion of a gentleman.”
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“I never went near the Wellesley College chapel in my four years there, but I am still amazed at the amount of Christian charity that school stuck us all with, a kind of glazed politeness in the face of boredom and stupidity. Tolerance, in the worst sense of the word.... How marvelous it would have been to go to a women’s college that encouraged impoliteness, that rewarded aggression, that encouraged argument.”
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“The more prosperous and settled a nation, the more readily it tends to think of war as a regrettable accident; to nations less fortunate the chance of war presents itself as a possible bountiful friend.”
—Lewis H. Lapham (b. 1935)
“Let these memorials of built stone music’s
enduring instrument, of many centuries of
patient cultivation of the earth, of English
verse ...”
—T.S. (Thomas Stearns)