Claremont School of Theology Receives $1 Million Grant

Claremont School of Theology (CST) announced today it is a recipient of a $1 million grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. to help the school sharpen its educational vision and reinvent its operational structures in order to better serve a profoundly changing church.

Lilly Endowment made the grant through its Pathways for Tomorrow Initiative. It is a three-phase initiative designed to help theological schools across the United States and Canada as they prioritize and respond to the most pressing challenges they face as they prepare pastoral leaders for Christian congregations both now and into the future.

“I am so excited for CST to have received this important grant,” said CST’s president, the Rev. Dr. Kah-Jin Jeffrey Kuan. “It will reinforce our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion within our institution and will strengthen our work in the preparation of leaders for the church — particularly for our students of color.

“I see the project as an extension of the ethos and values embedded in CST’s identity, and I could not be more grateful to Lilly Endowment for its visionary leadership in the creation and funding of the Pathways Initiative,” said Dr. Kuan.

CST’s proposal grew out of the need it identified for the school to serve rapidly changing demographics through world-class, Christian, and interreligious theological education rooted in spiritual formation, intellectual exploration, and innovative congregational leadership. The school will work to realign its operational structures and educational vision to holistically form agile, justice-oriented leaders for the transformation of the church.

Ordained clergy and lay ministers have had to respond and adapt to a swiftly changing world and a dramatically changing church. These congregational leaders need traditional theological education and spiritual formation as well as formation in leadership, entrepreneurial problem-solving, and in equity, diversity, justice, and belonging. CST has begun this work through curriculum, formation, and efforts in equity, diversity, justice, and inclusion by designing an educational experience that attracts and respects a diversity of perspective and experience.

CST’s project, titled “The Activating Change Project: Reinventing CST’s Operational Structures and Educational Vision to Educate Church Leaders for the Transformation of Congregations and Communities,” will lay out a three-year effort to redesign its educational strategies, institutional practices, and financial operating model, while relying on the ongoing and active participation of our administration, faculty, students, and alumni/ae and their congregations as we build towards a sustainable future.

CST is one of 84 theological schools receiving a total of more than $82 million in grants through the second phase of the Pathways Initiative. Together, the schools represent evangelical, mainline Protestant, nondenominational, Pentecostal, Roman Catholic and Black church and historic peace church traditions (e.g., Church of the Brethren, Mennonite, Quakers). Many schools also serve students and pastors from Black, Latino, Korean American, Chinese American and recent immigrant Christian communities.

“Theological schools have long played a pivotal role in preparing pastoral leaders for churches,” said Christopher L. Coble, the Endowment’s vice president for religion. “Today, these schools find themselves in a period of rapid and profound change. Through the Pathways Initiative, theological schools will take deliberate steps to address the challenges they have identified in ways that make the most sense to them.  We believe that their efforts are critical to ensuring that Christian congregations continue to have a steady stream of pastoral leaders who are well-prepared to lead the churches of tomorrow.”

Lilly Endowment launched the Pathways initiative in January 2021 because of its longstanding interest in supporting efforts to enhance and sustain the vitality of Christian congregations by strengthening the leadership capacities of pastors and congregational lay leaders.

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Established in 1885, Claremont School of Theology is fully recognized and approved as one of thirteen official theological schools of The United Methodist Church, with close relationships with other Protestant denominations, as well as many interreligious partnerships. CST offers graduate level programs, including Master of Arts, Master of Divinity, Doctor of Ministry, and Doctor of Philosophy degrees in religion and practical theology.

Lilly Endowment Inc. is an Indianapolis-based private philanthropic foundation created in 1937 by J.K. Lilly, Sr. and his sons Eli and J.K. Jr. through gifts of stock in their pharmaceutical business, Eli Lilly and Company. Although the gifts of stock remain a financial bedrock of the Endowment, it is a separate entity from the company, with a distinct governing board, staff and location. In keeping with the founders’ wishes, the Endowment supports the causes of community development, education and religion and maintains a special commitment to its founders’ hometown, Indianapolis, and home state, Indiana.  The primary aim of its grantmaking in religion, which is national in scope, focuses on strengthening the leadership and vitality of Christian congregations in the United States. The Endowment also seeks to foster public understanding about religion and lift up in fair, accurate and balanced ways the contributions that people of all faiths and religious communities make to our greater civic well-being.