Remembrance Sunday 2025 – order of service
Chichester’s Remembrance Sunday Service will take place in Litten Gardens on Sunday 9 November 2025
The order of service is below or you can download and print your own copy using this PDF:
CHICHESTER CITY COUNCIL
Order of Service for Remembrance Sunday
9 November 2025
REMEMBERING
A Royal British Legion representative gives the Exhortation:
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old; age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember them.
All affirm: We will remember them
The Last Post is played to signal the beginning of the two-minute silence.
2-minute silence.
Reveille is played to mark the end of the 2-minute silence.
A Royal British Legion representative gives the Kohima Epitaph When you go home, tell them of us and say, for your tomorrow, we gave our today.
The Reverend Canon David Nason commences the Service of Remembrance.
God is our refuge and strength; a very present help in trouble.
We meet in the presence of God. We commit ourselves to work in penitence and faith for reconciliation between the nations that all people may, together, live in freedom, justice and peace. We pray for all who in bereavement, disability and pain continue to suffer the consequences of fighting and terror. We remember with thanksgiving and sorrow those whose lives, in world wars and conflicts past and present, have been given and taken away.
The following prayer is said:
Ever-living God we remember those whom you have gathered from the storm of war into the peace of your presence; may that same peace calm our fears, bring justice to all peoples and establish harmony among the nations, through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen
The laying of wreaths at the War Memorial now takes place
The following hymn is sung:
1.
O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come.
our shelter from the stormy blast,
and our eternal home;
2
Beneath the shadow of thy throne
thy saints have dwelt secure;
sufficient is thine arm alone,
and our defence is sure.
3
Before the hills in order stood,
or earth received her frame,
from everlasting thou art God,
to endless years the same.
4
A thousand ages in thy sight
are like an evening gone;
short as the watch that ends the night
before the rising sun.
5
Time, like an ever-rolling stream,
bears all our years away;
they fly forgotten, as a dream
dies at the opening day.
6
O God, our help in ages past,
our hope for years to come,
be thou our guard while troubles last, and our eternal home.
THE READING by the Mayor of Chichester
St John’s Gospel (John 15.10-13)
Jesus said, ‘If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.’
PRAYING TOGETHER
The Reverend Canon David Nason says:
Let us pray for all who suffer as a result of conflict, and ask that God may give us peace: for the service men and women who have died in the violence of war, each one remembered by and known to God;
O God of truth and justice, we hold before you those whose memory we cherish, and those whose names we will never know. Help us to lift our eyes above the torment of this broken world and grant us the grace to pray for those who wish us harm. As we honour the past, may we put our faith in your future; for you are the source of life and hope, now and forever.
Amen
As we mark the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War we pray:
God of the nations, our refuge and our dwelling place, we remember with thanksgiving those whose service and sacrifice achieved Allied victory in the Second World War. We hold before you all those who still suffer from the devastation and traumas of war in the present time. As we pray for them, strengthen our resolve to pursue what makes for peace, through the one in whom we are reconciled and made one, even Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen
All join together in the Lord’s Prayer:
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy Kingdom come; thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. For thine is the Kingdom, the power, and the glory for ever and ever. Amen
The National Anthem is sung
God save our gracious King,
long live our noble King,
God save the King.
Send him victorious
happy and glorious
long to reign over us
God save the King
The Blessing
The Reverend Canon David Nason says:
Go forth into the world in peace; be of good courage; hold fast that which is good; render to no one evil for evil; strengthen the faint-hearted; support the weak; help the afflicted; honour all people; love and serve the Lord, rejoicing in the power of the Holy Spirit. May the Lord bless you and keep you; the Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you; the Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.
Amen
Sussex by the Sea is sung
Now is the time for marching, Now let your hearts be gay,
Hark to the merry bugles Sounding along our way.
So let your voices ring, my boys, And take the time from me,
And I’ll sing you a song as we march along,
Of Sussex by the Sea!
Chorus
For We’re the men from Sussex, Sussex by the Sea.
We plough and sow and reap and mow,
And useful men are we;
And when you go to Sussex, Whoever you may be,
You may tell them all that we stand or fall
For Sussex by the Sea!
Refrain
Oh Sussex, Sussex by the Sea!
Good old Sussex by the Sea!
You may tell them all we stand or fall,
For Sussex by the Sea.