New institute at Wycliffe among projects funded by U.S.Lilly grants

Notes: "A Toronto seminary is hoping its new institute for church research and data analysis will be a 'game-changer' for understanding how societal trends affect church decline and growth. In December [2021], the University of Toronto's Wycliffe College announced the establishment of the Canadian Institute for Empirical Church Research after receiving a grant of $1.27 million. The grant was one of several similar-sized grants the Lily [sic i.e. Lilly] Foundation, a U.S. philanthropical foundation, recently gave to North American theological schools. Wycliffe's institute will partner with WayBase, a Burlington, Ont.-based company that markets a platform intended to help churches grow their ministry through data analysis". "Stephen Andrews, principal of Wycliffe College and former bishop of the diocese of Algoma, says he's eager to learn what the project might tell us about the relationship between data and the life of the church". "Canon Neil Elliot, the Anglican Church of Canada's statistics and research officer, welcomes the establishment of the institute". The Montreal School of Theology (which includes the Anglican-founded Montreal Diocesan Theological College), the Vancouver School of Theology and Trinity College, Toronto, also received Lilly grants.

Subjects: Lilly Endowment - Grants; Theological colleges - Anglican Church of Canada; Wycliffe College (Toronto, Ont.); Canadian Institute for Empirical Church Research (Toronto, Ont.); WayBase (Burlington, Ont.); Church statistics - Canada; Anglican Church of Canada - Statistics; Andrews, Stephen (Stephen Gregory Weed), 1956-; Elliot, Neil (Neil Robert Minto), 1963-