Style or Substance

Doctrine is not decorative. It is constitutive. The church does not merely possess a creedal faith; she is shaped by it, governed by it, and sustained through it. When orthodoxy is quietly displaced, institutions may continue to function administratively, yet they no longer recognize their purpose. They become [...]

Among the most daunting challenges I have faced as a college professor has been the task of convincing my students that the study of history is an intrinsically worthwhile project. Perhaps accounting and engineering majors have always been a hard-sell in this regard, but the pervasive antihistorical spirit of our contemporary culture makes many students […]

1. Education: The Academy Calvin broke with medieval pedagogy that limited education primarily to an aristocratic elite. His Academy, founded in 1559, was a pilot in broad-based education for Geneva. Although Genevans had sought for two centuries to establish a university, only after Calvin's settlement did a college finally succeed. (1) By the time of […]

On October 8, 2008, the Literary & Historical Society of University College Dublin sponsored a debate on the motion that "this house finds it irrational to believe in God." In the nineteenth century, philosopher and lay theologian Søren Kierkegaard warned against such occasions; in his Concluding Scientific Postscript, he asked whether raising such a question […]