In early July, Witherspoon’s Natural Law and Public Affairs seminar, led by Christopher Tollefsen (University of South Carolina), Robert P. George (Princeton University), Sherif Girgis (The Witherspoon Institute) and Ryan T. Anderson (The Witherspoon Institute, The Heritage Foundation) helped students engage contemporary analytic work on the foundations and methods of natural-law moral reasoning and examine arguments that apply natural-law insights to a variety of moral and political issues.
First Principles, Witherspoon’s flagship seminar, led by R. J. Snell (The Witherspoon Institute), Anna Moreland (Villanova University), David Corey (Baylor University) and R. R. Reno (First Things) is currently underway. Students are engaging in lively discussions on traditional texts of metaphysics and epistemology as the backdrop for the university and readings in human action and the human good as a basis to examine friendship, sexuality, and relationship.
While the pandemic of 2020 resulted, unfortunately, in our deciding to move our seminars online, our fundamental values remain the same. We regret that much of what makes our seminars so valuable cannot be offered this year—Princeton’s campus, shared time together in person and the friendships this builds, and meals with professors. However, the fundamental content remains, as does our commitment to serious learning and real conversation. We are pleased and impressed with the deep engagement of students this summer.
