The rustle of a scholar’s gown. Dappled evening light glowing behind a stained-glass saint. The crackling of a candle being lit. The college chapel can easily feel removed from the 21st century university that surrounds it, with its breakneck pace and crushing deadlines. The robes, Latin hymnals, and retention of original features from centuries long gone by can almost convince the casual chapel-goer that they have stepped back in time… If they can ignore the digitally printed service card and electric lighting, that is. The chapel is a distillation of that special appeal of Oxford; surrounding oneself with that which is medieval, time-weathered, enduring.
That appeal, of course, raises a question: what is the place of the college chapel in the modern University of Oxford? In a community of which Christians, particularly Anglican Christians, are a minority, why does this particular set of religious forms and norms have an institutional place unlike any other? Chapels and their chaplains purportedly serve the multiplicity of faiths and belief systems Oxford houses – the phrase “all faiths and none” is beloved by Oxford chapels when describing their communities. At a glance, however, the Oxford set-up is an incongruous one: a largely non-religious population with a pastoral and welfare infrastructure which involves religious ministers.
How did we get here?
College chapels have been a part of Oxford life almost since the start of the University itself. The academic community in Oxford began to formalise its organisation in around 1249, with the founding of University College, originally intended to support masters of arts studying divinity. However, it was Merton College that first constructed its own purpose-built space for its academics to pray, sometime in the 1280s. Only later would the modern Christ Church College spring up around the older site of St. Frideswide’s priory. It became the city cathedral in 1546 at the order of King Henry VIII, head of the newly established Church of England.
The histories of Oxford University and the English Church are pretty inextricable. After all, Theology was one of three subjects awarded its own degree in the early University, alongside Medicine and Law. In the medieval period, scientific and theological knowledge were not distinct. When Philip Pullman chose to begin His Dark Materials, a story about an all-powerful world church, in Oxford, it wasn’t just because of his familiarity with the scenery. It was because the idea of the University being at the heart of the Church was drawn straight from history.
Oxford was a site of high drama in the formation of Anglican Britain. A cobbled cross built into the pavement on Broad Street marks the spot where prominent Protestant theologians were burnt alive during the reign of the Catholic monarch Mary I. The city housed the ‘counter-Parliament’ of Charles I during the English Civil War, a conflict with heavy religious strains. During the 19th century, it was the centre of the ‘Tractarian’ movement, which argued that the Anglican Church was not unique, but a branch of the historic Catholic Church. Throughout most of the University’s history, the chapels were not spaces peacefully removed from the political upheaval of the day. They were at its core.
A changing landscape
Today, however, the picture is very different. Conflicts within Christianity are no longer a major factor in politics or academia. Furthermore, people’s personal beliefs have greatly changed. According to data collected by the University in 2020, 55.4% of its undergraduate population had no religion. Of the 32.7% who professed to have a religion or belief, only 22.9% were Christian. Of these, given the proportion of Anglicans in the British Christian population, less than a third are probably adherents of the Church of England, especially when the University’s large international population is taken into account.
It’s hard to get a sense of the significance of these figures, as historical statistics on religion are tough to find and dubious at the best of times. However, the British Social Attitudes survey, which put the Christian population of Britain at a little over 60% in 1985, would indicate a marked decline, even if Oxford is more diverse than the country at large. The predominance of Anglican forms among college chapels, then, is a little at odds with the population of the University as it exists today.
A home for all?
Most chapels are very explicit that their services and other events are open to people of “all faiths and none.” The diversity of college chapels and their chaplains means that it is impossible to generalise the experience of chapel life for students. While older colleges are bound by their royal charters to provide ‘divine service’ in accordance with Anglican liturgy, they are by no means the only model. More recent additions have brought variety to Oxford’s chapels.
Harris Manchester College has a Unitarian chapel. Mansfield College roots its chapel in a nonconformist tradition, advertising talks on queer spirituality and social justice issues. At Somerville College, chapel service is centred around ‘Choral Contemplation’. It reimagines the Oxford choral tradition, aiming to make it a place for “all faiths and none”. Somerville’s present chapel scholar and director, Arzhia Habibi, is of the Bahá’i faith, which emphasises the oneness of all religions. Though Anglicanism predominates in Oxford chapels, their gatherings can be a space for a wide range of students.
The brick and mortar of the chapels reflect historical faith movements just as much as their service cards. Student opinion on their suitability varies. In response to a Cherwell survey, some students said that the Anglicanism of a college chapel doesn’t necessarily impede its ability to be a space for all students. One respondent, not themselves a Christian, argued that “we shouldn’t let this traditional aspect… be an issue.” Others were more concerned. Several believed that, while non-religious students might not be put off participating in chapel life, students belonging to a religion other than that of their college chapel might be more alienated. One said that their chapel, as a “decidedly Anglican” space, was “exclusionary as a place of worship to non-Christian students”, while another pointed to the history of discrimination against non-Anglican Christians in Britain. According to them, a “hegemonic, institutional view of organised religion has no place in the modern university.” Chapels might welcome visitors from a range of religious backgrounds, but students seem ambivalent on whether this affects their actual impact.
A world away
Perhaps such concerns might be balanced out if the chapel is treated as more than just a religious space. Most chapels are designed to make the visitor feel as if they have stepped into a demarcated area, away from the parts of the college focused on education. The ante-chapel, the cross at the top of the capital T that forms the basic plan of several college chapels, marks a transition from the humdrum to the profound.
This intangible quality was a common response to the question of the college chapel’s place in the modern university. One student called their chapel “an escape, a place of calm and peace.” In an environment like Oxford, oriented so completely towards productivity, this is a valuable thing. In the words of another student, “in a university where studying can feel endless and hectic and weeks seemingly merge into one another, college chapels (or at least my college chapel) offers an opportunity for reflection and stillness.” The Revd Dr Jane Baun, chaplain at Wadham, told Cherwell that during the COVID-19 pandemic, she was concerned to protect the chapel as a non-educational refuge, against thoughts of deploying it as a socially-distanced lecture hall
However, some found it off-putting that such relief was only offered in a religious context. One respondent made the case that while they tried “to appreciate the ‘peace’ and ‘vibes’ of these visually appealing historic buildings”, they were perturbed by their knowledge of the “tainted history” of the Church. For many students, Christian iconography signifies long histories of colonialism, patriarchy, and racism, although Christian ideas have been re-appropriated by movements for the liberation of marginalised people as well.
In fact, one Harris Manchester student saw their chapel as a catalyst for social consciousness. They spoke of the ethos of Unitarianism as a commitment to “truth and justice.” The range of speakers that are invited to address college chapel services indicate an effort to move away from a solely religious space. Representatives of various clergies appear, but artists, poets, scientists, and historians are often equally welcomed.
Still, chapels can’t be totally separated from the knowledge factory of Oxford. In many colleges, chaplains are a part of the infrastructure provided to students for pastoral and welfare support. Knowledge with religious bases can be helpful in day-to-day wellbeing, and chapel life seems for some to be a way to focus on mental, and spiritual, wellbeing in an environment that too often neglects it. However, there is something of a tension between the relief that a chapel is supposed to provide and the welfare system at Oxford, often focused just on restoring the student’s ability to work. Dr Baun told Cherwell that she was glad that welfare services are becoming more professionalised, so that full-time, fully secular members of non-academic staff are there for the student body.
The chapel can offer a space in which knowledge is absorbed, rather than reproduced around a tight tutorial deadline. Such opportunities should be extended as far as possible, and perhaps, in order for them to be extended to the non-religious or non-Anglican, beyond the chapel and into a wider variety of University spaces.
Common ground
There is no way to find the common thread connecting every person’s experience of chapel life. For some, the cold glare of a saintly statue and heavy-handed liturgical references to the virtue of virginity will be too much. For others, even those who are not religious, there is meaning in coming together with others on a Sunday evening, in the same way as people have gathered in that same space for centuries. Dr Baun lightheartedly referred to Wadham’s Sunday evensong as a ‘gathering of the tribe’.
Perhaps that is the most meaningful contribution of the college chapel. It is imbued with the generations of scholars and students who have passed through Oxford, each with their own ideas and inner lives. Every worn-down step or smoothened pew is a reminder of being a part of a greater whole, and not just in the college or university. Not every historical legacy associated with world religions is a comfortable one, and no two people will quite agree on the best way to reconcile tradition with modernity. Other parts of the built and lived-in environment might offer the same feeling. But if something can remind you of your own smallness, even just with its bricks and mortar, then maybe you can allow yourself to take a breath. Against the weight of time that these architectural relics represent, that deadline seems a little less crushing.
