Question 1

Do I need to be a Christian to participate?

Accepted Answer

No. Our events are open to all students, staff, and faculty of Princeton University and Princeton Theological Seminary, regardless of faith. Our programs are offered from a historic, orthodox Christian perspective, as expressed in the Nicene and Apostles Creeds. But you don't have to agree with us in order to participate.

Question 2

Are seminars open to non-students?

Accepted Answer

Please contact info@coverdaleprinceton.org if you are interested in attending our seminars but have no Princeton University affiliation.

Question 3

Why a Protestant distinctive?

Accepted Answer

We're a Christian study center first and foremost, but we do have a vested interest in the flourishing of the Protestant tradition. At least in part, that's because we are inspired by our Roman Catholic brothers and sisters. They are leaders in the academic world, not only because they are intellectually rigorous, but because they take their own tradition seriously. They aren't afraid to identify with their church; on the whole, they consider it an asset.Many Protestants in the academy feel they need to exit their tradition in order to be intellectually serious Christians. We don't agree: we think that the whole Church, Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox, benefits when the Protestant tradition is strong and flourishing. The riches of the Protestant tradition have important things to offer the church, the academy, and the world.

Question 4

Why not have a "mere Christianity" approach?

Accepted Answer

C. S. Lewis, author of Mere Christianity, had the best answer to this question. He argued that mere Christianity was like a hallway, and you can't stay in a hallway. Sooner or later, you have to enter the "rooms," the individual traditions of the Church, where there is food and warmth and life.This is all the more true for people trying to integrate their intellect and the faith. Doctrinal distinctives matter, and they are sources of strength. Blunting those doctrinal distinctives will never lead to a rich intellectual life.But we also don't mean "Protestant" as a way of defining ourselves forever negatively against some other group (as if we are those who "protest" Catholicism). That's not what the word originally meant or even means today: to "protest" just simply meant "proclaim" or "confess." Read more.

Question 5

Who was Coverdale?

Accepted Answer

Miles Coverdale (1488-1569), Bishop of Exeter, was an English reformer, preacher, theologian and Bible translator. His translation was one of the antecedents of the King James Bible, and the Coverdale Psalter is still used across the world, all day, every day, to pray and sing the Psalms, across many denominations. He began his life as a Catholic, was one of the first Bishops in the reformed Church of England, and ended his life one of the early English Puritans. In Coverdale are captured the immense breadth and depth of the western Christian tradition, not only in his theology and preaching, not only in his magisterial capaciousness, but also in his profound contribution to English literature through the aching beauty of his psalm translations. Coverdale embodied Protestant letters and intellectual life in its fullest form. The Bible is at the heart of our theological enterprise, and the praying of the Psalms in particular. Coverdale is a natural choice. Read more.

FAQs

Do I need to be a Christian to participate?

Are seminars open to non-students?

Why a Protestant distinctive?

Why not have a "mere Christianity" approach?

Who was Coverdale?

Be Part of the Formation