Well Endowed

While reading “Rick Warren’s Ministry Toolbox”, though I don’t recommend this website, they suggested, for further research, the American Religion Data Archive, along with this brief description about ARDA.

The American Religion Data Archive (ARDA) is a project funded by the Lilly Endowment, Inc. and acts to preserve quantitative data on American religion, to improve access to this data, to increase the use of the data, and to allow comparisons across data files. The ARDA collection includes data on churches and church membership,religious professionals, and religious groups (individuals, congregations and denominations).

This led me to wonder more about the American Religion Data Archive, so I went to their website where I read this.

About ARDA

The Association of Religion Data Archives (ARDA) strives to democratize access to the best data on religion. Founded as the American Religion Data Archive in 1997 and going online in 1998, theinitial archive was targeted at researchers interested in American religion. The targeted audience and the data collectionhave both greatly expanded since 1998, now including American and international collections and developing features for educators, journalists, religious congregations, and researchers. Data included in the ARDA are submitted by the foremost religion scholars and research centers in the world. Currently housed in the Social Science Research Institute, the College of Liberal Arts, and the Department of Sociology at the Pennsylvania State University, the ARDA is funded by the Lilly Endowment, the John Templeton Foundation, the Baylor Institute for Studies of Religion, and the Pennsylvania State University.

Source

ARDA is funded by the Lilly Endowment? Well, what’s that?

About The Lilly Endowment

What is the difference between the Lilly company and Lilly Endowment?

Eli Lilly and Company was founded in 1876 by Col. Eli Lilly. Three subsequent members of that family, J.K. Lilly Sr. and his sons Eli and J.K. Jr., founded Lilly Endowment in 1937 with gifts of stock in the pharmaceutical company. While stock in the company is the Endowment’s foremost asset, the Endowment is separate from the company. The Endowment, a private foundation, is in a different location, has a different board of directors, and is not linked to the company, except for the stock it holds.

Source

The endowment fund is “not linked to the company”? Well, I would say being named after it and holding stock in the company is a pretty significant link, wouldn’t you?

What’s that? You want to know more about Eli Lilly and Company? Okay.

About Eli Lilly And Company

Eli Lilly and Company (NYSE: LLY) is a global pharmaceutical company and one of the world’s largest corporations. Eli Lilly’s global headquarters is located in Indianapolis, Indiana, in the United States. The company was founded in 1876 by a pharmaceutical chemist, Eli Lilly, after whom the company was ultimately named.

…In 1953 the Central Intelligence Agency gave Eli Lilly Company a $400,000 grant to manufacture and supply lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) for the CIA. This was the first mass production of the chemical, and was used by a branch of the CIA known as MKULTRA.

…Among other distinctions, Lilly is the world’s largest manufacturer and distributor of medications used in a broad range of psychiatric and mental health-related conditions, includingclinical depression, generalized anxiety disorder, narcotic addiction, insomnia, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and others.

Source

See Also: Eli Lilly Controversy

Clinical depression, is that when you get depressed visiting your doctor?

So, in conclusion, we have a major psychiatric pharmaceutical company, with ties to the CIA, funding an endowment which in turn provides financial support to an organization that collects “research” information on churches and their members. Nothing unusual about that, I suppose.