Theology of Work Project Launches Obreros Program with Lilly Endowment National Storytelling Grant
News and Events / Produced by TOW Project
Date: December 2, 2025
Contact: Fernando Tamara
Reservoir Church of Cambridge, MA has received a grant of $5 million from Lilly Endowment Inc. through its National Storytelling Initiative on Christian Faith and Life. The grant will support the Obreros Initiative, led by the church’s partner, the Theology of Work Project (TOW). TOW will manage the initiative in partnership with the Windrider Institute and Reservoir Church, a community committed to creativity, storytelling and spiritual formation.
Reservoir Church is one of 60 organizations from across the United States that have received grants through the initiative since 2024. The organizations include media outlets, denominational judicatories, church networks, publishers, educational institutions, congregations and other nonprofit charitable organizations.
Obreros will draw on existing Hispanic Christian networks to surface the most compelling stories of faith, hope and vitality at work. The program will train filmmakers by offering 6 one-year filmmaking fellowships and 3 internships each year during the next 4 years. Obreros will produce and distribute stories of work from the Hispanic community in world-class film and video formats in Spanish with English subtitles. These stories will highlight the presence and power of Jesus Christ in the daily work of Hispanic community members, bringing fullness of life, meaning and opportunity, and leading to the service of neighbors, communities and the entire United States. Viewers will be inspired to grow in faith and Christ-like character as they connect faith with their own work.
“Through the Obreros Project, we hope to popularize uncommon and rare vignettes buried in the imagination of an emerging community of Hispanic Christian filmmakers. We will amplify their voices as we produce and curate real-life stories of adversity and resolution, suffering and perseverance, and unbelief and reexamination. These stories will illustrate to millions of viewers that any type of work, centered on the love of God and neighbor, can lead to personal wholeness and vocational commitment in our society,” says Fernando Tamara, Obreros Project Director and Executive Producer.
The aim of Lilly Endowment’s National Initiative on Christian Faith and Life is to help organizations identify, produce and share with a wide variety of audiences compelling stories that portray the vibrancy and hope of Christian faith and life.
Lilly Endowment Inc. is an Indianapolis-based private philanthropic foundation created in 1937 by J.K. Lilly, Sr. and his sons Eli and J.K. Jr. through gifts of stock in their pharmaceutical business, Eli Lilly and Company. Although the gifts of stock remain a financial bedrock of the Endowment, it is a separate entity from the company, with a distinct governing board, staff and location. In keeping with the founders’ wishes, the Endowment supports the causes of community development, education and religion and maintains a special commitment to its founders’ hometown, Indianapolis, and home state, Indiana. A primary aim of its grantmaking in religion is to deepen the religious lives of Christians, principally by supporting efforts that enhance congregational vitality and strengthen the leadership of Christian communities. The Endowment values the broad diversity of Christian traditions and endeavors to support them in a wide variety of contexts. The Endowment also seeks to foster public understanding about religion by encouraging fair, accurate and balanced portrayals of the positive and negative effects of religion on the world and lifting up the contributions that people of all faiths make to our greater civic well-being.
Image by Javier Gómez . Used with Permission.
Author: Theology of Work Project.
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