Living Waters Trust

Living Waters Trust is a family-controlled private foundation administered entirely by three uncompensated Schulze family trustees — Peter B. Schulze, Karen Gottlieb Schulze, and Gabriel David Gottlieb Schulze — and managed administratively by Keel Point, a Tysons, Virginia wealth advisory firm. With approximately $18M in assets and roughly $1M in annual giving, this is a mid-sized faith-based trust whose grantmaking reflects deeply personal family values rather than an institutional program strategy.

The single most critical fact for any prospective applicant: Living Waters Trust is confirmed preselected and invitation-only. Foundation records show `preselected_only: true` and no published application instructions. The foundation's listed website does not host a grants program — it redirects to an unrelated church. There is no application portal, no published deadline, and no RFP cycle. Cold proposals sent without prior relationship are unlikely to be reviewed by trustees.

Grantees are overwhelmingly Christian faith-based organizations spanning Catholic and Protestant traditions, united by explicit theological mission and international reach. The portfolio includes global medical missions (Cure International), disability ministry (Joni & Friends), Christian satellite broadcasting to the Middle East and North Africa (Sat-7 North America), Catholic contemplative communities (Visitation Monastery, Daughters of Mary Mother of Israel, Sisters of Life), children's welfare in Italy (Santa Chiara Children's Center), and Israeli emergency medicine (American Friends of Magen David Adom). This diversity across Christian traditions signals that the Schulze family prioritizes mission alignment and direct beneficiary impact over denominational loyalty.

First-time applicants should invest in relationship capital before approaching. The foundation's repeat-grant pattern — with top grantees receiving 3 to 5 successive grants — confirms a preference for deepening existing partnerships rather than funding new organizations. Organizations with ties to Cure International's leadership, Joni & Friends, Sat-7, or the National Christian Fund ecosystem are best positioned to earn a trustee introduction. Organizations outside the explicit Christian faith, medical mission, disability, or vulnerable-children intersection should look elsewhere.

Living Waters Trust maintains total assets of approximately $18.1M as of FY2024, down from a peak of $23.9M in FY2021. Annual charitable disbursements have ranged from $800,100 (FY2022) to $1,161,785 (FY2023), with grants paid tracking closely to disbursements at $742,600 to $911,783 annually across recent years. Investment income — primarily dividends and capital gains — is the sole meaningful revenue source, with contributions effectively zero since FY2020.

Grant size benchmarks (from foundation records): - Median grant: $79,000 - Minimum grant: $3,600 - Maximum grant: $165,000 - Average grant: $82,511 - Average across all 41 tracked grants: $99,684

Top 8 recipient organizations by cumulative funding: - National Christian Fund: $1,022,983 across 5 grants (donor-advised re-granting vehicle) - Cure International: $1,000,000 across 5 grants (Christian medical missions, global) - Joni & Friends: $600,000 across 5 grants (disability ministry, US and international) - Sat-7 North America: $500,725 across 3 grants (Christian broadcast, Middle East/North Africa) - Visitation Monastery: $250,000 across 3 grants (Catholic contemplative community) - Daughters of Mary Mother of Israel: $250,000 across 3 grants (Catholic religious order) - Santa Chiara Children's Center: $246,000 across 4 grants (children in poverty, Italy) - Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund: $117,000 across 5 grants (DAF vehicle)

Estimated allocation by program focus: - International Christian missions and media: ~55% of tracked giving (Cure International, Sat-7, Santa Chiara) - Disability and special-needs ministry: ~15% (Joni & Friends) - Catholic religious communities: ~13% (Visitation Monastery, Daughters of Mary, Sisters of Life) - Donor-advised fund vehicles for flexible re-granting: ~10% (National Christian Fund, Fidelity) - Jewish humanitarian aid: ~1% (American Friends of Magen David Adom) - Other faith and community: ~6% (Aid to the Church in Need, Keyara's Gift, Inreach Ministries)

Geographically, grantee organizations are headquartered across 10 states — California and New York each claim 6 grantees; Ohio, Georgia, and Pennsylvania each show 5. Given the foundation's international focus (Cure International operates in 30+ countries; Sat-7 broadcasts across 22 nations), physical grantee headquarters understates the global footprint of the giving.

The table below compares Living Waters Trust to four peer faith-based private foundations of broadly similar size and philosophy. Asset and giving figures for peers are approximate estimates derived from publicly available IRS 990-PF filings; exact figures vary by fiscal year.

Living Waters Trust occupies the smaller end of established faith-based private foundations, but its asset base is large enough to sustain consistent seven-figure annual giving for the foreseeable future. Unlike larger peers such as Maclellan Foundation — which maintains a public website, publishes guidelines, and accepts letters of inquiry — Living Waters Trust operates with complete discretion and no public transparency. Among the peers listed, only Aid to the Church in Need maintains an open application pathway; the rest, like Living Waters Trust, rely entirely on preselection and relationship-driven access. Organizations seeking to engage faith-based family foundations should treat this entire category as relationship-first, paperwork-second.

Web research conducted in June 2026 returned no direct news coverage, grant announcements, leadership changes, or public statements attributable to Living Waters Trust in 2025 or 2026. The foundation's intentionally private posture — no public website for grants, no press releases, and no media presence — is consistent with the family-controlled, invitation-only nature of its grantmaking.

The most recent confirmed IRS filing data (FY2024) shows $18,061,208 in total assets and $914,350 in revenue, with $1,016,498 in charitable disbursements. This continues a multi-year trend of modest asset compression: assets peaked at $23,878,187 in FY2021 and have declined approximately $5.8M (24%) over three years as disbursements outpace investment returns.

A notable historical inflection point: in FY2019 and FY2020 the foundation received contributions of $11.9M and $11.7M respectively, expanding assets from under $1M in FY2015 to $22.5M by year-end FY2020. This represents the Schulze family's primary endowment transfer into the trust. Since FY2021, contributions received have been negligible or zero, placing the trust firmly in a disciplined spend-down phase.

No trustee changes were identified. Peter B. Schulze, Karen Gottlieb Schulze, and Gabriel David Gottlieb Schulze have appeared on every available IRS filing as the sole trustees. All three receive zero compensation, consistent with a family philanthropy operation.

Given that Living Waters Trust operates as a closed, invitation-only family foundation with no published application process, the following tips are grounded in what the grant data and foundation structure actually reveal — not generic grant-writing advice.

1. Do not cold-apply. There is no form to submit. The foundation has no grants page, no application portal, and no published deadline. Sending an unsolicited proposal to findoutmore@living-waters.org reaches Keel Point administrators, not the Schulze family trustees, and will not be reviewed through any formal pipeline.

2. Map your network before reaching out. Identify any board members, major donors, senior staff, or institutional partners with personal ties to Peter B. Schulze, Karen Gottlieb Schulze, or Gabriel David Gottlieb Schulze. Keel Point (8405 Greensboro Drive, Suite 900, McLean/Tysons, VA) is a wealth management firm; professional advisors in its network may be introduction channels.

3. Build via existing grantees. Cure International, Joni & Friends, and Sat-7 North America are the most active multi-year recipients. If your organization has collaborative relationships, leadership overlap, or coalition membership with any of these organizations, leverage those connections for a warm introduction.

4. Align your mission language precisely. The grant portfolio reveals four clear pillars: (a) Christian evangelism and media outreach to unreached or restricted populations; (b) medical and humanitarian care in the developing world delivered through a faith framework; (c) disability ministry with a theological dignity-of-life foundation; and (d) support for Catholic religious communities in contemplative or apostolic service. Your introductory communication should name the pillar you inhabit — do not present a general-purpose nonprofit pitch.

5. Lead with international impact. Five of the top eight grantees serve beneficiaries outside the United States. If your program serves people in the developing world, persecuted-church contexts, or medically underserved global communities, foreground that reach prominently.

6. Propose a multi-year relationship, not a single project. Every top grantee has 3-5 repeat grants. Frame your initial ask as the beginning of a sustained partnership, with year-one goals that set up multi-year progress markers.

7. Communicate stewardship credentials. The foundation gives exclusively for general support — no program-restricted grants are evident in the data. Demonstrate robust financial management, audited financials, and lean overhead. Reference other faith-based funders supporting your work to signal community trust.

8. Timing estimate. No formal review cycle is published. Based on FY close patterns (December 31 fiscal year), grants are likely approved in Q3-Q4 (September-November) for calendar-year disbursement.