Louisville Institute Grant Presented to UA Professor of Religion and New College

Tuscaloosa, Ala. – Dr. Theodore Trost, an associate professor of religious studies at The University of Alabama who is cross appointed to New College, has been awarded a research grant from the Louisville Institute, a program of the Lilly Endowment Inc.

The grant of $45,000, one of only six the Louisville Institute awarded for the coming year in connection with the study of United States religious institutions, will enable Trost to study the United Church of Christ’s recent nationwide efforts to define its identity, notably its television ad campaign.

Trost’s research focuses on the meaning of the United Church of Christ’s “God is Still Speaking,” advertising campaign. He will focus on such aspects as what shapes the campaign, its meaning, and the campaign’s relationship with the histories of both the denomination and American Protestant churches, in general.

The United Church of Christ’s inclusive appeal to seekers of all sorts represents a bold challenge to the sociological research that recommends a degree of exclusivity as a strategy for churches to recruit and retain members, Trost said.

His research will also consider whether the campaign represents a new possibility in fostering long-term mainline Protestant survival or whether the costly initiative will hasten the denomination’s demise.

“The Louisville Institute is widely recognized for supporting innovative research on religion in America,” said Dr. Robert Olin, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. “This grant speaks well of Trost’s scholarship and of the important research being done in the department of religious studies and New College. The College of Arts and Sciences is delighted that the Louisville Institute has recognized this important work with this research grant.”

“The Louisville Institute is among the best known organizations in the U.S. that fund research on religion in America,” said Dr. Russell T. McCutcheon, associate professor and chairman of the department of religious studies. “Trost’s project is timely – especially given the apparently prominent role that religious affiliation seems to be playing in U.S. politics – and clearly the Louisville Institute recognizes this in awarding him one of its six annual grants to study U.S. religious institutions.”

“The United Church of Christ is not particularly well known in Alabama; but, through its historical connection to the Congregational churches of Puritan New England, it is arguably the oldest Protestant denomination in the United States,” said Trost.

“The Louisville Institute grant gives me the opportunity to combine my interests in the history of religions in North America, especially Protestant denominationalism, and contemporary media studies,” said Trost. “I am profoundly grateful for this opportunity.”

Trost came to UA in 1998, after completing his doctoral studies at Harvard. Although his early training was in Biblical studies, his expertise is on religion in the U.S. and its role in popular culture.

The Louisville Institute is a Lilly endowment program for the study of American religion based at Louisville Seminary. The Lilly Endowment Inc. is an Indianapolis-based private philanthropic foundation created in 1937 by three members of the Lilly family.

The College of Arts and Sciences is the University’s largest division and the largest public liberal arts college in the state with 6,600 students and 360 faculty. Students from the college have won numerous national awards including Rhodes Scholarships, Goldwater Scholarships, and memberships on the “USA Today” Academic All American Team.