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.
École de Théologie Évangélique du Québec
Ruth Elaine Labeth
Ruth Elaine Labeth
To study the composition of scripture-based songs in Creole churches in Guadeloupe to help worship leaders and pastors envision culturally contextualized worship.
Fresno Pacific University
Amy Whisenand
Amy Whisenand
To explore the relationship between singing and reconciliation in the church through hosting workshops for scriptural study, practice sharing, and collaboration.
Hope College
David Keep
David Keep
To deepen worshipers' theology and spiritual life by creating an online Advent calendar that features visual art and music, and by holding art interpretation events and panel discussions in which participants engage theological truths—particularly the incarnation—through the arts.
University of Notre Dame Folk Choir
J.J. Wright
J.J. Wright
To teach Christian communities how to see grace and mercy in loss and suffering by enabling young people to contemplate difficult questions as they rehearse and perform the newly composed Passion for the Innocents.
Allen Chapel AME Church (2021)
To enrich worship by engaging the arts in order to promote healing and understanding in the midst of social injustices.
Mercer University
Nathan Myrick
Nathan Myrick
To identify, through ethnographic research, the myriad ways that musical worship participates in human flourishing, and to share these insights with Christian leaders in order to promote healthy and vibrant communities of Christian fellowship and worship.
Baylor University
Monique M. Ingalls
Monique M. Ingalls
To conduct ethnographic fieldwork of interethnic gospel choirs and to identity promising strategies for how worship music can build "convivial" interethnic congregational cultures.