Religion

Description

The Louisville Grawemeyer Award honors highly significant contributions to religious and spiritual understanding. By “religion” we mean, to paraphrase a classic definition by William James, the feelings, acts and experiences of humans insofar as they apprehend themselves to stand in relation to whatever they consider the divine. The purpose of the Award is to honor and publicize annually creative and constructive insights into the relationship between human beings and the divine, and ways in which this relationship may inspire or empower human beings to attain wholeness, integrity or meaning, either individually or in community.

This award is granted by both the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary and the University of Louisville to those who have presented ideas with the potential to bring about change in the world through religion.

Prize Amount
The Grawemeyer Award in Religion is accompanied by a prize of $100,000, which is presented in full during the awards ceremony.

Eligibility
Any work (book, address, essay, etc.) presented or published in 2017 or subsequently will be eligible for consideration. Nominations are invited from religious organizations, appropriate academic associations, religious leaders and scholars, presidents of universities or schools of religion, publishers and editors of scholarly journals. There will be no discrimination based on religious affiliation or belief or lack thereof. The Award Committee encourages submissions from a wide variety of intellectual and/or religious perspectives. Please note that a work may be nominated for a maximum of three Award Years. Self-nominations will not be accepted. Previous winners are not eligible for subsequent awards. The Award will not be awarded posthumously.

Charles Grawemeyer was an active Presbyterian and a man who took the study of religious ideas seriously. In fact, he took university religion courses during his retirement, making his inclusion of an award for religion only natural.

Dr. John Mulder, former president of the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, recounted the day in 1984 when Grawemeyer invited him to lunch, and simply said: “John, you know the music award won’t be the only one. I’d like to create a prize in education, world order and religion. I want the seminary to be part of the religion award.”

The Grawemeyer Foundation, the University of Louisville and the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary promptly began to shape the prize. Natural hurdles arose, and many questions surfaced. “What is an award in religion about?” “Is it simply Christian faith, or does it include other traditions from peoples around the world?” Even more contentious: “Should the work be more ‘popular’ and less ‘academic’?” “Should it be inspirational or should it promote questioning or honor revisionary proposals?”

These and other issues were resolved and guidelines were set, including a provision that the selection committee would include at least one person of non-Christian faith and someone from outside North America or with extensive experience outside North America.

The first award was presented in 1990 to E.P. Sanders for his provocative book, Jesus and Judaism, a painstaking look at Jesus’ relationship with his Jewish contemporaries.

The 2025 Grawemeyer Award in Religion

Purpose
The Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion honors highly significant contributions to religious and spiritual understanding. By “religion” we mean, to paraphrase a classic definition by William James, the feelings, acts and experiences of humans insofar as they apprehend themselves to stand in relation to whatever they consider the divine. The purpose of the Award is to honor and publicize annually creative and constructive insights into the relationship between human beings and the divine, and ways in which this relationship may inspire or empower human beings to attain wholeness, integrity or meaning, either individually or in community.

Eligibility
Any work (book, address, essay, etc.) presented or published in 2018 or subsequently will be eligible for consideration. Nominations are invited from religious organizations, appropriate academic associations, religious leaders and scholars, presidents of universities or schools of religion, publishers and editors of scholarly journals. There will be no discrimination based on religious affiliation or belief or lack thereof. The Award Committee encourages submissions from a wide variety of intellectual and/or religious perspectives. Please note that a work may be nominated for a maximum of three Award Years. Self-nominations will not be accepted. Previous winners are not eligible for subsequent awards. The Award will not be awarded posthumously.

Criteria For Judging Nominations
The Award competition, which is open to persons of all religious traditions and world views, will consider a wide variety of concerns and issues. Such issues may include but are not limited to:

    • The experience of divine or ultimate reality,
    • Meaning and purpose of human existence,
    • Authority and freedom in religious understanding,
    • Pluralism and religious truth,
    • Evil, suffering, and death,
    • Compassion, joy and hope,
    • Religion and science,
    • Divine involvement in human history,
    • Practices of faith and spirituality.

Preference will be given to ideas:

    • which by their clarity and power assist people better to understand the relationship between divine reality and human spiritual striving;
    • which lead to a recognition and understanding of religious experience;
    • which foster greater understanding and cooperation among adherents of diverse religious traditions and views;
    • which stimulate new insights into the relationship between religious awareness and other forms of human knowledge;
    • which reflect significant breakthroughs in our understanding of divine-human relationships, particularly in the context of the postmodern world.

Nomination Process
Each person or group nominating an idea for consideration must submit one (1) copy of each of the following in typed or printed form:

    • A supporting statement of between 500-750 words in English setting out the central idea of the work and specifically relating the idea to the criteria for the award.
    • The work as published or printed (in the case of a speech, the written text or transcript) including all standard bibliographic and copyright citations.
      • Individuals and groups (non-publishers) submitting nominations are requested to supply one (1) copy of the work.
      • Publishers submitting nominations are requested to supply the required total of six (6) copies of the work.

Deadline
Nominations must be received by January 15, 2024. All submissions become the property of the Louisville Grawemeyer Award Committee. In the event that no idea is considered adequately meritorious in a given year, no award will be made.

The Review Process
A joint Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary and University of Louisville faculty review committee will consider all nominations and advance a select number for further consideration. Three judges of international reputation will select three finalists. Recommendation of a winner from among the finalists will be made by a winner selection committee consisting of laypersons and administrators. The recommended Grawemeyer Award winner is subject to approval by the Trustees of the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary and the University of Louisville Board of Trustees.

Awardee Requirements
The winner of the 2025 award will be announced around December 1, 2024. The winner will be expected to come to Louisville during the following spring to make a formal presentation based on the winning idea and to receive the Award. The trip to Louisville is mandatory and failure to fulfill this requirement will result in forfeiture of the Award and the associated cash prize.

Nominee agrees and accepts that, consistent with the intent of H. Charles Grawemeyer, the Award will not be given posthumously. The Nominee must be living in order to receive the Award and must participate in the Award festivities referenced above in order to receive the Award and the associated cash prize. If the nominated Work was created by multiple persons, one or more of whom is deceased, only the living nominees are eligible to receive the Award and the associated cash prize.

The payment will cease upon the death of the recipient. Winning the Award does not create any property rights in the cash prize for the recipient’s heirs or estate. In the event that the Award is given to multiple recipients (such as co-authors), there is only one cash prize associated with the Award and said cash prize will be divided evenly amongst the recipients. If a co-recipient dies before payment of said cash prize is made, the remaining amount will be divided evenly between the still-living co-recipients.

Nominee shall participate, as appropriate, and cooperate in the production of any documentary film or other public relations or publicity matters related to the Competition, including the execution of any necessary releases and/or authorizations.

Nominee hereby grants permanent permission for the University of Louisville and the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary Board of Trustees to use the title and excerpts from the Work and any media depicting their receipt and acceptance of the Award for library and archival purposes, and for the purpose of promoting the Grawemeyer Awards and their affiliation with the University of Louisville and the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary. The term “media” is understood to include, but not be limited to, audio and visual images and/or recordings of any format which depict the Recipient’s visit to the campuses of the University of Louisville and the Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, the Awards presentation itself and any comments made by the Recipient as part of the campus visits and the Awards festivities.

All physical materials submitted become the property of the University of Louisville and Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

For More Information
Retrieve the 2025 Nomination Form

Contact
Nominations and requests for further information may be submitted electronically, by mail, or via facsimile, and should be sent to:

Dr. Tyler Mayfield, Faculty Director
The Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion
Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary
1044 Alta Vista Road
Louisville, Kentucky 40205-1798

Phone: +1 (502) 894-2291
E-mail: grawemeyer@lpts.edu
Website: www.grawemeyer.org

2023 – Kelly Brown Douglas

How do we really know God cares when Black people are still getting killed? How long do we have to wait for God’s justice?

Hearing her son ask those questions and seeing Black Lives Matter protests erupt nationwide after George Floyd’s death led theologian Kelly Brown Douglas to write “Resurrection Hope: A Future Where Black Lives Matter.” Today she was named winner of the 2023 Grawemeyer Award in Religion for the book’s ideas.

Read More…

2022 – Duncan RyĹ«ken Williams

A scholar who explained how Japanese American Buddhists remained true to their faith even after being forced into U.S. detention camps during WWII has won the 2022 Grawemeyer Award in Religion.

Duncan Ryūken Williams, a religion professor who directs the Shinso Ito Center for Japanese Religions and Culture at the University of Southern California, won the prize for ideas set forth in “American Sutra: A Story of Faith and Freedom in the Second World War,” his 2019 book published by Harvard University Press.

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2021 – Stephen J. Patterson

A religious scholar who explained how one of Christianity’s earliest creeds still applies to contemporary life has earned the 2020 Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion.

Stephen J. Patterson, a professor of religious and ethical studies at Willamette University, won the award for ideas he set forth in “The Forgotten Creed: Christianity’s Original Struggle against Bigotry, Racism and Sexism.” Oxford University Press published the book in 2018.

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2020 – No Award Given

2019 – Robert P. Jones

White Protestantism has dominated U.S. politics and culture for much of the nation’s history, but demographic change and an exodus from churches by the young are bringing the era to a close.

That prediction comes from Robert P. Jones, founder and chief executive officer of Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), who has won the 2019 Grawemeyer Award in Religion for his book, “The End of White Christian America.” Simon & Schuster published the work in 2016.

Read More …

2018 – James H. Cone

In The Cross and the Lynching Tree (Orbis Books, 2011), renowned theologian James H. Cone passionately conjoins the provocative images of the first-century cross and the twentieth-century lynching tree. The book earned Cone the 2018 Grawemeyer Award in Religion.

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2017 – Gary Dorrien

Renowned social ethicist Gary Dorrien describes the early history of the Black Social Gospel from its nineteenth-century founding to its close association in the twentieth century with W. E. B. Du Bois. He offers a new perspective on modern Christianity and the civil rights era.

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2016 – Susan R. Holman

Religion and public health: author explores an interdisciplinary approach to global well-being.

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2015 – Willie James Jennings

Why has Christianity, a religion based on love, failed in its attempts to heal racial division?

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2008 – Margaret Farley

“Just Love: A Framework for Christian Sexual Ethics”

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2007 – Timothy Tyson

“Blood Done Sign My Name”

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2005 – George M. Marsden

“Jonathan Edwards: A Life”

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2004 – Jonathan Sacks

“The Dignity of Difference: How to Avoid the Clash of Civilizations”

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2003 – Mark Juergensmeyer

“Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence”

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2002 – Miroslav Volf

“Exclusion & Embrace: A Theological Exploration of Identity, Otherness, and Reconciliation”

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2000 – JĂĽrgen Moltmann

“The Coming of God: Christian Eschatology”

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1997 – Larry L. Rasmussen

“Earth Community, Earth Ethics”

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1995 – Diana L. Eck

“Encountering God: A Spiritual Journey from Bozeman to Banaras”

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1994 – Stephen L. Carter

“The Culture of Disbelief: How American Law and Politics Trivialize Religious Devotion”

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1993 – Elizabeth A. Johnson

“She Who Is: The Mystery of God in Feminist Theological Discourse”

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1992 – Ralph Harper

“On Presence: Variations and Reflections”

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1991 – John Harwood Hick

“An Interpretation of Religion: Human Responses to the Transcendent”

Read More…

2024 Recipient

Rev. Charles Halton

Scholar focusing on God’s human qualities wins 2024 religion prize

By Denise Fitzpatrick

God gets angry. God gets jealous. God hates, regrets and learns.

Theologians often dismiss those depictions of God in the Bible because they seem to clash with God’s image as an all-loving being, but an Episcopal priest with a different view has received the 2024 Grawemeyer Award in Religion for helping explain the paradox.

The Rev. Charles Halton, associate rector of Christ Church Cathedral in Lexington, Ky., won the prize for ideas set forth in his 2021 book “A Human-Shaped God: Theology of an Embodied God.” He argues that embracing God as a deity with human qualities can bring us closer to God and inspire us to become better people.

“We are, like God, to move from a place of exclusion and anger-fueled violence to a life of inclusion, radical forgiveness and compassion,” he said. “This is the path God is on. If we are not on it too, we are not imitating God.”

As an example, Halton cites the Old Testament story of how God floods Earth, destroying everything except Noah’s Ark. Later, God feels regret and creates a rainbow in the sky.

“Many Bible accounts are springboards for theological imagination that help us see God in constructive ways,” he said. “As humans, we too lash out in anger, but we also learn to forgive.”

Halton explores “an underappreciated view of God that exists in the Bible but is absent from most Eurocentric theology,” said Tyler Mayfield, who directs the religion award. “His approach is original, thought-provoking and offers new opportunities for understanding the biblical God.”

Halton taught Old Testament and Semitic languages at seminary and college levels for nearly a decade. He holds a doctorate from Cincinnati’s Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Bible and ancient Near East studies and is an external affiliate at the Centre for the Study of Judaism and Christianity in Antiquity at St. Mary’s University, Twickenham, London.

The University of Louisville and Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary jointly give the religion prize.

Recipients of the 2024 Grawemeyer Awards were named this week pending formal approval by trustees at both institutions. The $100,000 prizes also honor seminal ideas in music, world order, psychology and education. Winners will visit Louisville in the spring to accept their awards and give free talks on their winning ideas.

Video Interviews with Past Recipients

2018 Religion Recipient James H. Cone was not able to travel to Louisville to present his winning idea. JoAnne Marie Terrell presented the spring 2018 lecture on his behalf. To see a video of Terrell’s lecture, click here.

The New Abolition: W.E.B. Du Bois and the Black Social Gospel
2017 Religion Recipient Gary Dorrien

An Interdisciplinary Approach to Global Well-Being
2016 Religion Recipient Susan R. Holman

How Christianity has Contributed to Segregation and Racism in America
2015 Religion Recipient Willie James Jennings

How God Becomes Real for People
2014 Religion Recipient Tanya Luhrmann

Why a Growing Number of Muslim Women in the U.S. are Wearing Veils
2013 Religion Recipient Leila Ahmed

The Relationship between Black Politics and Religion
2012 Religion Recipient Barbara D. Savage

Recognizing the Ways Different Faiths are Alike
2011 Religion Recipient Luke Timothy Johnson

Interfaith Cooperation rather than the Bombs of Religious Destruction
2010 Religion Recipient Eboo Patel

Interview With Donald Shriver Jr.
2009 Religion Recipient Donald Shriver Jr.

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