New Center for Liturgy initiative aims to foster children’s participation in worship
The University of Notre Dame has received a grant of $1.25 million from Lilly Endowment Inc. to create a three-year research and education initiative intended to foster children’s participation in worship in the context of late modernity. Lilly Endowment made the grant through its Nurturing Children Through Worship and Prayer Initiative.
Situated within the McGrath Institute for Church Life’s Notre Dame Center for Liturgy, the initiative, called Contours of Wonder: Childhood and the Liturgical Imagination, seeks to renew liturgical formation in the Church by identifying the proper dispositions necessary for children and adults alike to worship God. Contours will then develop pastoral programming that cultivates a liturgical-sacramental imagination in dioceses and parishes.
Contours of Wonder is inspired by Romano Guardini’s scholarship on the liturgical formation of the child and adolescent. Commenting on Guardini’s importance to the initiative, Timothy O’Malley, academic director of the Notre Dame Center for Liturgy, noted: “Romano Guardini understood that if we were to develop a humane culture in an age characterized by technology, the abuse of power and frenetic activity, we need to remember what it means to be a liturgical creature. The formation of the child in the proper dispositions for worship will not only be good for the child but also for the entire human family.”
Through Contours, Notre Dame will partner with Villanova University to host three scholarly gatherings, culminating in three research volumes. Based on this research, a series of workshops and a leadership cohort will be piloted in partner dioceses across the United States. Cohort participants will spend a year exploring new ways to approach the liturgical formation of children and will develop implementation plans for their own churches, schools and dioceses. The initiative will culminate in a capstone conference in the summer of 2026.
To promote ongoing scholarship in this area, Contours will also host lectures and webinars throughout the three-year initiative and offer academic research fellowships to undergraduate and graduate students at the University of Notre Dame. An undergraduate course at Notre Dame will also be created, introducing Notre Dame students to contemplative and sacramental practices necessary for human flourishing.
“We are engaging with scholars from across disciplines as well as parents, catechists, pastors and children themselves. Essential to this initiative is ensuring that our research contributes meaningfully to the academy while remaining accessible to the wider Church in a way that inspires a transformation in how children are both understood and formed,” said Lesley Kirzeder, program director of the initiative.
O’Malley concluded by saying: “We are grateful to Lilly Endowment for enabling us to participate in this initiative. Since its founding in 1970, the Center for Liturgy has had a special focus on the formation of children for participation in the liturgy. This grant, therefore, is a natural outgrowth of our mission to renew the liturgical and sacramental imagination of the Church. It’s a gift to engage in this kind of pastorally informed research and teaching that allows us to directly serve the Church in the unique way that a University can.”
Originally published by mcgrath.nd.edu on Feb. 28.
atLatest Faith
- Con todo el corazón (With all our heart)Coro Primavera celebrates Latino community on campus Enter the Basilica of the Sacred Heart during the 3:30 Sunday Mass, and you’ll hear a choir singing the tunes of the same church songs you remember—except the lyrics are in Spanish. Or you may hear some different melodies that bring new…
- de Nicola Center presents 24th annual Fall Conference, ‘Ever Ancient, Ever New: On Catholic Imagination’More than 1,200 scholars, students and guests from around the world will attend the de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture’s 24th annual Fall Conference, “Ever Ancient, Ever New: On Catholic Imagination.” The conference features more than 175 papers, panels and performances across three days of conversation on the enduring and inexhaustible nature of the Catholic imagination.
- Sister Draru Mary Cecilia, LSMIG, receives Notre Dame Award for Outstanding Contributions to Catholic EducationThe Notre Dame Award for Outstanding Contributions to Catholic Education, awarded by the Alliance for Catholic Education, honors those who have made generous, lifetime commitments to sustain and strengthen Catholic schools. As executive director of the African Sisters Education Collaborative, Sister Draru oversees the education for Catholic sisters in 10 African countries. She has spent much of her life working to expand women’s education in Uganda and elsewhere on the African continent.
- Notre Dame Forum to present ‘Fr. TED Talks’ on Catholic social tradition, featuring President Rev. Robert A. Dowd, C.S.C., and Dr. Jim O’ConnellHonoring the legacy of legendary University of Notre Dame President Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, C.S.C., the 2024-25 Notre Dame Forum will host “Fr. TED Talks: Ideas from the Catholic Social Tradition That We Find Inspiring,” a two-night festival on Oct. 28 and 29.
- Notre Dame receives Lilly Endowment grant to support development of faith-based frameworks for AI ethicsThe University of Notre Dame has been awarded a $539,000 grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. to support Faith-Based Frameworks for AI Ethics, a one-year planning project that will engage and build a network of leaders in higher education, technology and a diverse array of faith-based communities focused on developing faith-based ethical frameworks and applying them to emerging debates around artificial general intelligence.
- de Nicola Center to award 2025 Evangelium Vitae Medal to Anthony and Phyllis LauingerThe de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture will award the 2025 Notre Dame Evangelium Vitae Medal — awarded to heroes of the pro-life movement — to Anthony J. and Phyllis W. Lauinger of Tulsa, Oklahoma, at a Mass and dinner on May 3, 2025, at the University of Notre Dame.