The Graven Award is funded by the Judge Henry N. and Helen T. Graven Endowment for The Ministry of the Laity: The Church in the World and goes to a person "whose life is nurtured and guided by a strong sense of Christian calling and who is making a significant contribution to community, church and society."

Judges Henry N. and Helen T. Graven were lay people from Greene, Iowa, who made significant contributions to the church, including the outline for the first pension plan for workers of the church. Mr. Graven, a federal Judge in Iowa, along with his brother, did much of the legal work in the combining of three separate Wartburg College sites into one.

Graven's son, Lloyd, an economic research consultant, spoke about his father's work as a Federal District Judge. He said, "Long before the U.S. Supreme Court started ruling on Civil Rights issues, my father fined the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake for not letting a black man in." He also said that his father believed it was important for Christians to contribute to society.

Past Recipients:
1990    Arnold R. Mickelson
1992    Anne H. Carlsen
1992    Reinhold P. Marxhausen
1993    William H. Foege
1994    Ralston Deffenbaugh, Jr.
1995    Weston H. Noble
1996    James J. Raun
1997    Henry W. Foster
1998    Anne Knutson Kanten
1999    Her Excellency Anna Josephine Mkapa
2000    General John W. Vessey
2001    Neil and Lillian Williams
2002    William Fintel
2003    Gaylord Thomas
2004    Carl Schalk
2005    David Scheie
2006    Robert D. Ray
2007    K.D. Briner
2008    Greg Mortenson
2009    Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
2010    Lane Shetterly (PDF)