Collective Worship

Collective worship in Church of England schools in Exeter Diocese schools provides an opportunity for everyone to stop, gather, reflect and share. It is a time of the school day to be set apart and valued, where members of the school community can meet together in an inclusive and invitational manner, to worship God.

All schools are required by law to provide pupils with a daily act of collective worship regardless of whether or not they are a Church school. The difference with church schools lies in the fact that all acts of worship must be Christian. The whole school community involves all pupils and all staff, unless they have sought the right to withdraw from acts of worship.

Church of England Guidance document on Collective Worship in Church schools

Collective worship will be:

Inclusive: In the Church school pupils, their families and other adults can expect to encounter worship that is inclusive of, and fully accessible to, all. This will involve meeting, exploring, questioning and responding to others and, for some, to God.

Invitational: Parents, pupils and adults can expect to encounter worship that is consistently invitational. There should be no compulsion to ‘do anything’. Rather, worship should provide the opportunity to engage whilst allowing the freedom of those of different faiths and those who profess no religious faith to be present and to engage with integrity.

Inspiring: Pupils and adults can expect the worship they encounter in a Church school to be inspirational. Worship should be formational and transformational: it should enable pupils and adults to ask big questions about who we are and why we do what we do. It should motivate pupils and adults into action, into thinking differently, and into reflecting on their and the wider community’s behaviour and actions.

Faith in the Nexus

Faith in the Nexus is a research project which explores how church primary schools facilitate opportunities for children’s exploration of faith and spiritual life in the home. This report identifies the fruitful ways in which church primary schools (working in collaboration with churches and other interested stakeholders) can facilitate opportunities for the exploration of children’s faith/spiritual life in the home.

Model collective worship policy