Religious Students at Brown: The Silent Minority?

Inside Manning Chapel on a sunny Sunday morning, the dozens of polished, oak pews stretch from front to back, but only the first three rows are occupied at today’s 12:30 PM “Call to Worship,” the Progressive Protestant service held by Brown University each week. Some fifteen students sit dutifully and piously, in jeans and sweaters and a few in khakis. In unison, they read from flimsy, stapled, photocopied programs a few verses from the book of Mark, and follow it up with a solemn worship song from The Hymnal.

At the front of the chapel and the center of the elevated pulpit stands the leader of the worship service, Reverend Janet Cooper-Nelson, who speaks to the tiny congregation in a prim, quiet voice that carries across only the pews it needs to. The reverend is in her mid-fifties, with a small, petite frame and salt-and-pepper hair styled neatly and cropped at her ears. Garbed in a simple white robe and black sash, she exudes more gentleness than authority with a contented halfsmile on her face while she leads recitations and song.

The Ecumenical Protestant service lasts only an hour, so Reverend Cooper-Nelson’s sermon is short. It seems more like an inspirational lecture than a good preaching-to; today’s topic is “All Saint’s Day,” and her words focus on its history and application. She likens All Saint’s Day to a kind of “Hero Appreciation Day.”

“Look at who your heroes are,” she says in closing, “and find out what it is that makes them your heroes.” She bows her head with the congregation and gives her benediction, and with the cue of hymnal piano music, sends the churchgoers out into the world.

“A Call to Worship” is only one of many religious services offered by Brown University. On Sunday alone, Manning Chapel also hosts the morning Roman Catholic Mass and an evening Imani Jubilee contemporary worship service. Other days bring everything from Zen Meditation to Taize Service. All in all, the campus has over twenty official “faith communities” representing the several different religions. Brown University was founded in 1764 as a Baptist university, under a charter promising that all graduates would “discharge the offices of life with usefulness and reputation.” The Office of the Chaplains and Religious Life opened in the 1930s when the university became completely non-sectarian and open to all faith communities.

Today, Reverend Janet Cooper-Nelson oversees these faith communities, not merely as the mild-mannered and tender Protestant minister, but as the university’s chaplain and head of Religious Affairs. For the last fifteen years, she has devoted herself to maintaining vigor in religious life on campus and tried to make it a part of every student’s Brown experience.