Worship

One of the most important aspects of training for Christian life is vigorous, inspiring, and varied participation in corporate worship. Our community gathers for worship eight times throughout the week in Goodson Chapel. Services of morning prayer are held at 8 a.m. Monday through Friday. A service of Word and Table is held on Wednesdays, and a service of Word on Thursdays. The week concludes with a Friday afternoon service in the Pentecostal, Holiness, Revivalist tradition. The Divinity Choir, and the Praise and Worship Team sing regularly for weekday worship. A new Gospel Choir also has been formed. The Divinity School Chaplain shares leadership of the services with students, faculty and staff.

Faculty members, administrators, and students share joint responsibility for these services that seek to express the variety and diversity of theological and liturgical traditions represented in the community.

The Divinity School enjoys a particularly close relationship with Duke Chapel. Divinity School administrators and faculty, as well as guests of national and international stature, preach at Sunday morning worship services. Many students join the 200-plus member Duke Chapel Choir that provides choral music on Sunday mornings and special music programs throughout the academic year, including an annual Christmas performance of Handel's Messiah. Divinity students and faculty also contribute to the leadership of the ministry of Duke Chapel by chairing and serving on standing committees: Faith and the Arts, Supportive Ministries, Worship, Prophetic Concerns, and Leadership and Development.

Students are also strongly encouraged to involve themselves in the life of a local church community, either through the field education program or on one's own initiative.