“Our aim is to help parents and other caregivers nurture children’s development of a trustworthy theology and daily practices of faith through the power of story,” the church wrote in its proposal to Lilly Endowment, noting that it will create children’s resources based on concepts from “Fierce Love,” a book by the church’s senior minister, the Rev. Jacqui Lewis. “We will pilot facilitated Just Love Story Circles to gather diverse parents/caregivers as they nurture babies, toddlers, and preschoolers with just love in a setting that fosters appreciation of racial diversity and promotes healthy development.”
The Yvette A. Flunder Foundation, a nonprofit affiliated with City of Refuge United Church of Christ in Oakland, California, and supporting the Fellowship of Affirming Ministries, has been approved for a $930,000 grant. Bishop Yvette Flunder, the foundation’s executive director, said the money will be used to develop books, curricula and home activities to accentuate her religious groups’ support of Black LGBTQ families. The nonprofit plans to create a “Radically Inclusive Parenting Project” that will provide in-person and online spaces for supporting parents and caregivers and a seminary-partnered certificate program for faith leaders to create programs in their communities.
“There’s a lot of hubbub in the air about young people not being able to read certain books, young people not being able to experience families other than perhaps what I call the ‘Leave It to Beaver’/’Father Knows Best’ kind of nuclear family,” Flunder said. “The intention is to open up an understanding of the divine that suggests that all people are loved and all people are received and all people matter and there is no greater race than another or a greater kind of family than another.”
Like other grant recipients, leaders at Calvary Lutheran Church, a rural Evangelical Lutheran Church in America congregation in Alexandria, Minnesota, expect to instill confidence in parents to take greater leadership in building the faith of young people. Its grant of $976,470 will help fund programs involving technological tools for parents to guide their children.
“We’re living in a time where rural families are increasingly isolated and the demands of work, school and activities make it difficult for traditional programs to be successful,” Pastor Angie Larson told RNS. “We hope to decentralize the work of faith from being in the church to coach parents with the tools to implement it at home.”
Judith Cebula, Lilly Endowment’s communications director, said the June grantees follow an initial 22 organizations that received grants in 2022, bringing the total funded to more than $124 million.
“We are especially interested in efforts that nurture the religious lives of children, youth and young adults and that share the beauty and vibrancy of Christian faith with a new generation,” she told RNS in a statement.
Religion News Service receives funding from the Lilly Endowment through the Religion News Foundation.
This article originally appeared here.
