Micah Watson, politics professor and executive director of the Henry Institute, and Matthew Lundberg, religion professor and director of the De Vries Institute, have collaborated to publish a new campus edition of Richard Mouw’s The Worldview of the Synod of Dort in booklet form, released in October 2025. The content was originally an address given by Mouw in Dordrecht during the 2018 celebration of the 400th anniversary of the Canons of Dort — one of the “historic Reformed expressions of the Christian faith, whose doctrines fully agree with the word of God,” according to the Christian Reformed Church. In his speech, Mouw — Calvin philosophy professor from 1968-1985 and president of Fuller Theological Seminary from 1993-2013 — explores the enduring significance of the Canons for Reformed life and thought on Calvin’s campus and beyond. Watson and Lundberg put the address in booklet form, making it easily accessible for anyone interested in reading it.

According to Lundberg, the project began with “a suggestion from Micah Watson. We thought about putting this into a little booklet form that can be easily distributed here on campus.” The booklet, he said, would be shared with “the president’s cabinet” and the  broader Calvin community in the fall, and with “the board in January,” with the hope that “it might just get us all thinking more creatively about ways in which the Reformed documents that govern Calvin can continue to inform us in ways that are tied to the actual challenges that we’re facing today.”

In the booklet’s introduction, Watson and Lundberg write that Calvin’s Confessional Commitment and Academic Freedom document describes the creeds and confessions in terms such as sight, foundations and spiritual food — specifically as they relate to matters of academic freedom. “The creeds and confessions are meant to be wells, not only walls,” they write in the booklet. For Lundberg, that metaphor captures the spirit of the project: “If the confessions, including the Canons, are important for the faith integration that we’re doing … then this could be really useful.”

He explained that Mouw’s essay “draws out some of the more surprising implications of the Canons of Dort,” going beyond predestination to how the Canons “help us think about our global citizenship … and about the quest for justice.”

Lundberg noted a phrase that he and Watson emphasized in their foreword — what Mouw calls “a sweetness and softness to the pursuit of justice.” That tone, says Lundberg, is “pretty countercultural today, where there’s a lot of take-no-prisoners approaches to justice, whether from the right or from the left.”

Mouw’s essay, reprinted in the booklet, argues that Reformed Christians should “engage others, with a measure of the sweetness and softness that we have learned from our encounters with the mysteries of sovereign electing grace!” The Canons, he writes, remind us that “we are by nature neither better nor more deserving than others, but with them involved in one common misery.” Such humility, Mouw concludes, means that “to pledge to live under the Rule of Dordrecht is to decide to be out of step with much that goes on these days, not only in the larger culture, but even in the Christian community.”

Lundberg echoed that sentiment, describing the essay as “an invitation more than anything else to give the confessions a second look … to consider the possibility that they may be able to inform and govern us in ways that are surprising, and needful at this moment in our culture — probably at this moment in our institution as well.”

For Watson, the republication of Mouw’s work is both a historical and institutional renewal. “The Canons of Dort are one of the three articles of faith for the Christian Reformed Church and other Reformed bodies around the world,” he said. They are “not just a historical meeting, but an ongoing part of the life of the church.”

Watson explained that these articles of faith are timeless: “Ideas don’t go moldy with time. Jesus said, ‘I’m the same yesterday, today and forever.’ Our understanding can adjust … but the doctrines do not go moldy with time.”

Watson wants Calvin’s community to recognize the confessions — and their authority — as blessings, not burdens. “Too often here we see them as burdens — ‘Oh, come to work at Calvin, you have to agree with these things.’ No. You get to delve into these things. It’s a gift.” Lundberg reassures that “our administration and board have made very clear that these documents, and the way they shape Calvin, are not going away.”

Both Watson and Lundberg see the booklet as a resource not only for faculty and administrators but for students wrestling with faith and their identity in Christ. Lundberg observed that students “who have been taken by the Calvin-ness of their Calvin education … could dig a little further into some of the deep-level sources that animate this place.” For others, the booklet might connect theological reflection with public life. “Students these days seem to be pretty interested in ‘acting justly,’” he said. “There’s an invitation here to allow certain things about the Christian gospel to shape how we pursue justice, and how we think about our presence in the world.”

Watson echoed the invitation. “Calvin doesn’t make students sign a statement of faith,” he said. “But we invite students to come here, whether you’re from the Reformed background or not, and we tell them, ‘Hey, come and check this out. We think it’s important. We think it’s worth wrestling with. We would love to wrestle with it alongside you.’”

Mouw’s conclusion, calling readers to take “a special vow to submit to what we might think of as the Rule of Dordrecht,” resonated deeply with Watson and Lundberg. Lundberg reflected, “We ended up with the new form of the Calvin logo on the front of the booklet, and the more historic form on the back … ‘My heart I offer to you, Lord, promptly and sincerely’ — not because we just like to say it, but because we actually think it’s really important to submit that way as Christians.”

In Watson and Lundberg’s project, Mouw insists that the Canons of Dort — and the grace they proclaim — are “not merely words addressed to the past. They ring true for us in many ways in this 21st century.”