The Church of England today launches a new section of its website in celebration of 150 years of the parish magazine.
The Church estimates that the combined readership of its parish magazines exceeds that of several national newspapers, taken together.
Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, says on the new web-site: “A good parish magazine is a wonderful resource that places the local church at the heart of the community it serves.
“We owe our gratitude to all those who labour lovingly to produce this regular shop-window for their church or parish. As a team or solo, with a generous budget or an alarmingly fraying shoestring, this is a ministry we need to recognise and to support.”
The site comprises:
Commendation from the Archbishop of Canterbury
150 not out: A historical sketch
In praise of church magazines . . .
Tributes from the Editors of the Church Times and Church of England Newspaper
Prayer for magazine editors
Links to on-line resources
No-one is quite sure exactly when the modern parish magazine was born, but despite claims for Frome's The Old Church Porch (first published 1854), it is generally thought that Erskine Clarke's Parish Magazine of January 1859 probably marks the real start of the genre.
There is great potential for collecting information from site visitors about other early magazines, and the Church of England web-master has no wish to find himself celebrating the wrong date. So if any readers know better, they are invited to contact him right away!
“These much-maligned publications could be the secret weapon of ‘the mission-shaped church’”, says Peter Crumpler, the Archbishops’ Council’s Director of Communications. He goes on to suggest four key actions to give parish magazines a future:
Look good;
Be a vital part of your church’s mission;
Know your readership – and encourage them to take part;
Work with the church’s other communications channels.
Ends
Further information from Louis Henderson: (020) 7898 1326
Notes for editors
The new site is at http://www.cofe.anglican.org/about/diocesesparishes/parishmags/
The Archbishop of Canterbury’s commendation in full:
“The Church of England is big in publishing, but not just in the world of books and liturgy. Most of the Church’s 13,000 parishes produce some sort of magazine, and even if each issue could muster only 100 readers that would give a total combined circulation larger than The Times, The Guardian and The Independent together. But we can be confident that the readership of parish magazines is much larger than that - particularly as some 1.7 million people attend a Church of England church each month.
“A good parish magazine is a wonderful resource that places the local church at the heart of the community it serves. They are the most widely read Christian publications in the country - and many people are likely to read them without ever setting foot inside a church.
“As we celebrate the parish magazine in its modern form, marking the 150th anniversary of Erskine Clarke’s launch of The Parish Magazine in 1859, we owe our gratitude to all those who labour lovingly to produce this regular shop-window for their church or parish. As a team or solo, with a generous budget or an alarmingly fraying shoestring, this is a ministry we need to recognise and to support.”
+Rowan Cantuar
Item from: The Church of England