The Kuyperian Legacy
Leading theologian (and
from 1901 to 1905 the Prime Minister of Holland), believed that one of God’s
greatest creations was the human mind; much in the spirit of Saint Augustine,
he urged his followers to engage in philosophical reflection. His legacy in
America includes Calvin College, which from the 1920s to the 1950s left its
mark on an extraordinary number of well-known philosophers, including O. K.
Bouwsma, William Frankena, and William Harry Jellema.
—Alan Wolfe, The Atlantic,
October 2000
The other source of intellectual
strength in conservative-Protestant circles was the Christian Reformed Church,
founded in America in 1857 by immigrants from the Netherlands. Abraham Kuyper,
the Church’s