Welcome to the
Global
Formation
Project
Our project in numbers
22
Projects worldwide
9+
Years of grant work
45+
Country participants
About the Global Formation Project
What characteristics are associated with spiritual maturity, character, and virtue? What can we learn from global and ecumenical Christian communities about how spiritual maturity is embodied, understood, and cultivated? Our overarching goal is to highlight and make more accessible the unique insights and contributions from the many expressions of Christianity as they exist throughout the world on how we can more thoughtfully and faithfully cultivate greater Christlikeness in our communities.
Come find out more about what we are learning.
Where we are.
Our team and partners are conducting research and building resources to support discipleship and spiritual formation around the world.
Our Partners
We are partnering with key global institutions, networks, researchers, and leaders to conduct interdisciplinary research on global perspectives of character and spiritual maturity (with representation from Africa, Asia, Oceania, Europe, Central and South America, North America, as well as indigenous communities residing throughout the globe).
Publications and Resources
Our team has published, developed, and curated both scholarly and practical resources on spiritual formation. As new resources become available, we will be adding them here.
The Evolution of our Project
Phase 1 (2016-2022)
Our project began with the convening of 18 Ecumenical North American Seminaries and the Association of Theological Schools (ATS) to explore how different seminaries supported the spiritual formation of their student body. This work culminated in a large-scale empirical (quantitative and qualitative) longitudinal research study involving over 1500+ seminary students over a three year period. This research leveraged over 50 psychometrically-validated measures of character, virtue, and various religious/spiritual practices in the research literature to explore several research questions related to the empirical measurement of spiritual development/formation over time.
Phase 2 (2023-2029)
Our findings from this North American study indicated that spiritual formation is not a one-size-fits-all phenomenon, but one that is profoundly shaped by culture, identity, and context. This inspired us to consider what we could learn if we were to expand the scope of the project globally, so that we could prepare the groundwork for a global, ecumenical exploration into how the people of God understand, embody, and cultivate Christlikeness in their context. Accordingly, we have partnered with over 20+ global Christian communities and networks to seed research and resourcing initiatives to explore what spiritual formation might look like in their native context. In addition to a series of regional and global gatherings, this current phase of the project will also curate an online repository of scholarship and resources pertaining to spiritual formation from the global church.
