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The Episcopal Diocese of West Virginia has received a grant of $3.9 million from Lilly Endowment Inc. through its National Storytelling Initiative on Christian Faith and Life 2025. The grant will support the creation of Seeds of Hope Storytelling.
The Episcopal Diocese of West Virginia is one of 60 organizations from across the United States that have received grants through the initiative since 2024. The groups include media organizations, denominational judicatories, church networks, publishers, educational institutions, congregations and other nonprofit charitable organizations.
Seeds of Hope is a five-year, faith-based, event and multimedia storytelling ministry rooted in the distinctly Christian Appalachian experience. Through trainings and live events, Seeds of Hope will seek out and nurture Appalachian storytellers whose voices carry the beauty, struggle, and hope of their faith. Stories from these events will then be produced in high-quality multimedia formats, including a digital and print magazine, podcasts, and documentary-style short films, and will be featured as part of an annual Appalachian storytelling festival.
The Right Reverend Matthew Cowden, Bishop of West Virginia, looks forward to Seeds of Hope’s impact, noting, “Appalachians are natural storytellers. Through this storytelling initiative, we seek to shift the impressions and misconceptions West Virginians have about Christian faith and open the door to encountering the love of God and the love of community. By honoring the dignity of both storyteller and listener, Seeds of Hope will create spaces where hearts soften, faith awakens, and communities are knit together.”
The aim of Lilly Endowment’s National Initiative on Christian Faith and Life is to help organizations identify, produce and share with a wide variety of audiences compelling stories that portray the vibrancy and hope of Christian faith and life.
About Lilly Endowment Inc.
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. A primary aim of its grantmaking in religion is to deepen the religious lives of Christians, principally by supporting efforts that enhance congregational vitality and strengthen the leadership of Christian communities. The Endowment values the broad diversity of Christian traditions and endeavors to support them in a wide variety of contexts. The Endowment also seeks to foster public understanding about religion by encouraging fair, accurate and balanced portrayals of the positive and negative effects of religion on the world and lifting up the contributions that people of all faiths make to our greater civic well-being.
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