1855 Knollcrest Circle SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49546-4402 USA
On the campus of Calvin University and Calvin Theological Seminary
© 2024 Calvin Institute of Christian Worship
CICW has awarded Vital Worship, Vital Preaching Grants for over 20 years to teacher-scholars and worshiping communities in 45+ states and provinces and across 40+ denominations and traditions—including Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Pentecostal, non-denominational, and other Protestant communities.
While worship styles and practices vary greatly across these traditions, the grant projects typically explore at least one of CICW’s ten core convictions related to worship. Explore the hundreds of projects we’ve funded across both streams of the program.
Brad East
To deepen Christian discernment about the impact of digital technology on Christian worship through the study of both challenges and opportunities presented to churches, pastoral ministry, and public worship by new digital mediums.
Melody Escobar
To explore worship practices that foster belonging among marginalized populations through an ethnographic study of an interdenominational church that worships under a highway overpass.
Antonio E. Alonso
To spark deeper conversations about the significance of the materiality of lived Christian practice through theological reflection on the reception of Vatican II liturgical reforms in Asian, Latine, and Black Catholic contexts.
Jonathan Rodgers
To examine post-COVID worship in the Southern Baptist Church through interviews and surveys to gain an understanding of how worship has been and is being reconfigured.
Beth Argot & Kayleen Bobbitt
To conduct fieldwork exploring the use of pilgrimage, movement, and the arts in worship as means of healing trauma and encouraging spiritual integration (knowing God with both our heads and our hearts).
Michelle A. Stinson
To explore the topic of time through biblical/theological, environmental, and agrarian reflections, probing how God’s care for creation as experienced in nature’s seasons and agriculture’s rhythms offers renewed hope as we emerge from an extended season of Covid-tide.
Amy Whisenand
To explore the relationship between singing and reconciliation in the church through hosting workshops for scriptural study, practice sharing, and collaboration.
Sarah Travis
To enhance the worship and self-identity of very small congregations through a theology of playfulness, by networking with leaders of small congregations, and writing a resource designed to enhance worship in small churches.
Layla A. Karst
To explore the pastoral and theological implications of online pandemic Liturgies of the Word, focusing especially on the translation of ritual practices between off-line and online worship and on emerging understandings of ecclesial leadership and authority.
Emily Andrews and Will Kynes
To learn from and with an ecumenical group of churches unfamiliar with the practice of corporate lament to gather the most important questions and pastoral concerns related to practicing corporate lament, and to develop practices for retrieving and employing lament in worship.
Marcell Silva Steuernagel
To engage in ethnographic research in collaboration with congregations in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex in order to promote integrative ecclesial environments that bridge the racial divide between White, Black, and Latinx constituencies.
Antonio Alonso
To tell the story of the theological significance of ordinary material objects and the theological convictions they express, in order to encourage deeper attentiveness to the diverse materials through which we worship God.
