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Remembrance Day at Alton School

Our Remembrance Day service is a relatively new addition to life at Alton School, but it has become an important part of our life as a Christian community.

It has taken different forms over the years, and this year will be the most unusual yet as we embrace the new normal world of pre-recorded film clips and Microsoft Teams, but some features have remained constant and are consistently inspiring. We sing ‘Abide with me’, the School President reads ‘A Call to Remembrance’, we listen to a Gospel reading about love and sacrifice, we recall names of people associated in some way with our school family who are to be commemorated, a poppy wreath is laid, and the Last Post and Reveille are played. Ritual is an important part of community life, and these familiar, poignant rituals have enriched ours.

The most striking feature of our Remembrance Day service is the silence that we experience together, a silence born of respect and gratitude for those who sacrificed themselves for the life we now enjoy. As parents, you will understand that silence does not come easily to children (even the impeccably behaved young people at Alton School!), so it is remarkable that the whole of the Prep and Senior Schools gather (usually in the cold) and remain in respectful silence throughout the service and as they leave to go back to their lessons. The silence is tangible, mysterious and beautiful.

This year we gather as a community not in physical proximity, but united, really – not just virtually – by our desire to remember the bravery and self-sacrifice of those who died so that we might live.

Tim Gay – Head of Religious Studies.

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