The Interior
If President Hibben’s words are to be taken at face value, the Chapel is an
attempt to win students and faculty back from the temptation of materialism, luring
them - with the bait of beauty and the light of reason - into daily services
that were no longer required. Because of this the building can be best
understood as an argument in glass and stone, an argument that one encounters
most pointedly when entering the building. The most formidable challenge to
Christianity, and religion in general, has always been the problem of
evil. If God is all-powerful and all-good, then why do bad things happen?
In the narthex one finds the greatest Hebrew response to that problem, the
book of Job. The book begins up the north stairway, and ends up the south
stairway where God addressing his afflicted servant from the whirlwind of
holy wisdom with a bewildering counter-question to human questioning of
divine intent. Exit the narthex into the 74-foot nave and
one is confronted with the second response to the problem of evil offered
by the Chapel, that God would actually become a Job, taking on affliction
and evil upon himself in the person of Jesus Christ. Before entering, be sure to notice the Princeton prayer on the back wall.
