Many years ago, the culture critic Allan Bloom offered this translation of Yale's Hebrew motto, Urim V'tumim: "If you can read this, you don't belong here."

He was alluding to a time when Yale, like other elite schools, was less than welcoming to Jews. But nowadays, of course, colleges and universities of all sorts try hard to welcome students from a variety of faiths. This year, for the first time, Yale provided its Muslim students with halal food and a private prayer space during Ramadan. Fatema Al-Arayedh, a member of Yale's Muslim Students Association, says that everyone in the administration "rose to the call and did whatever was possible."

But Yale is not yet satisfied with its progress. Recently, on the recommendation of a committee charged with finding "ways to strengthen the growing expressions of religious and spiritual life," Yale announced its decision to cut the ties between its chapel and the United Church of Christ. But will that move really strengthen "religious and spiritual life" on campus?

Yale was founded in 1701 by Congregationalist ministers to prepare students for clerical vocations. By the late 19th century, it was well on its way to becoming the "secular" school we know today. Its chapel, however, continued to draw its ministers from the Congregationalists. In 1961, after many New England Congregationalists merged with German Lutherans to become to the United Church of Christ, Yale's chapel followed suit.

The Rev. William Sloane Coffin, perhaps Yale's most famous chaplain, shepherded the chapel through this change. An ardent supporter of civil rights and opponent of the Vietnam War, Mr. Coffin was perfectly in step with the United Church of Christ's mainline Protestant theology and social activism. He went on to become pastor of New York's Riverside Church, but his name and principles will always be associated with Yale's chapel.

Given such a legacy, it would seem an odd moment for Yale to sever its United Church of Christ affiliation. Liberal thinkers are calling for a religious left to counter what they see as the "values monopoly" of the religious right. They might well look to Yale's chapel as a source of hope. Yale, to its credit, is not thinking politically. But just how is it thinking?

Martha Highsmith, the interim pastor at Yale's chapel, hopes that the split with the United Church of Christ will let the chapel become "more welcome to a variety of Protestant denominations." But stripping away an affiliation may not be the best way to meet this goal.

Hans Leaman, a member of Yale's Graduate Christian Fellowship, notes that "students who are serious enough about their faith to go to church on Sunday are going to be testing churches out for doctrinal orthodoxy." He acknowledges that the United Church of Christ long since ceased being doctrinally orthodox, by traditional standards, but that makes the recent decision only more suspect. "With Yale's church becoming unhinged even from the UCC, I can't see that instilling any greater confidence."

Yale's idea seems to be that doctrinal differences run the risk of alienating students from a house of worship. But the opposite may be the case: Doctrine, even weakly expressed, signals a seriousness of religious purpose. It honors a religious tradition -- even a liberal tradition -- and habits of devotion. For religious students these days, the greater alienation comes from a dilution of belief into a vague, "inoffensive" spirituality. (It is hardly surprising that the committee used the phrase "spiritual life" in its call for changing the chapel's identity.)

And besides, believers of different faiths are not quite so squeamish as all that: Orthodox Jews routinely support evangelical politicians these days; Mormons ally themselves with Catholics on social issues. Members of differing religious traditions often feel a greater distance from secular culture than from one another.

If Yale is interested in strengthening religious expression on campus, it might want to think more about dorm policies, for instance, than about chapel affiliation. It was eight years ago that five orthodox Jewish students there sought to live off-campus because the co-ed dormitories forced them to encounter in the hallways half-naked members of the opposite sex. The students were denounced for being judgmental and told that, if they did leave campus, they would still have to pay the $7,000 dorm fee. (They lost a subsequent lawsuit.)

At the time, a Yale spokesman explained that co-ed dorms were just one "aspect of the Yale educational experience." Yes, of course. But it is one aspect that might be taken up by a committee charged with figuring out how to make religious students at Yale feel more welcome. Maybe the committee should meet again.

—Naomi Schaefer Riley is an adjunct fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and the author of God on the Quad.