AN Isle of Wight community magazine has taken the top prize in a competition to find the most-improved publication in Portsmouth’s Anglican diocese.

Editors Teresa Hayles and Zoe Chapman with the dean of Portsmouth Cathedral, the Very Rev David Brindley

Island Magazine Takes Diocesan Award

Village News, which serves the parishes of Calbourne, Newtown and Shalfleet, won the title of ‘Most Improved Parish Magazine 2006’ at a reception for parish magazine editors.

The three parish churches decided to improve their communications to villagers. At the same time, Calbourne’s civic parish council wanted to do the same. So worshippers and parish councillors joined forces to produce the community magazine.

Within weeks, a brand new 24-page magazine was posted through the letterboxes of 900 homes in the villages just before Christmas 2005. Alongside church news there was information about people, clubs, societies and events, all available free of charge. Advertising had been secured from a range of local businesses to finance the monthly publication.

Editors Teresa Hayles and Zoe Chapman accepted the first prize of £200 – to spend on their publication – from the dean of Portsmouth’s Anglican cathedral, the Very Rev David Brindley, in front of magazine editors from around the diocese.

Teresa said: “I’m amazed that we won, but it’s only down to the hard work of the entire team. We couldn’t have done it without the distributors, the advertisers and the tremendous response of people in the villages. Now our challenge is to keep up the standard!”

The runner-up in the competition – which measured improvements over the past two years – was Trinity Times, produced by Holy Trinity Church, Gosport. It was launched in May 2004 and is delivered each month to 1,200 households and all 160 shops, offices and business in the parish, free of charge. It won £100. Judges were impressed with its clear design, sense of humour and pride in the church’s Anglo-Catholic heritage.

And third place and £50 went to Faithworks, produced by St Faith’s Church in Lee-on-Solent. The four-page A4 newsletter is delivered to all 3,000 homes in the parish. Anecdotal evidence suggested it had been incredibly effective in bringing new people to church services and activities.

The reception came after an Evensong in the cathedral devoted to the work of parish magazines. Ronald Graham-Clarke, who has edited the Froxfield and Privett Parish Magazine since 1977, read a lesson, and Jenny Ainsworth, who edits Contact for St John’s, Newport, led intercessions. The dean also spoke of the importance of parish magazines in his sermon.

“Parish magazines are actually a vital tool in our communication with those within our parishes and in our mission to those who don’t come to church,” he said. “The parish magazine might be the only communication in the entire village or locality.

“In many parts of the country, the parish magazine might be the only spiritual input that many of its readers ever get. In a world where the media increasingly pours scorn on genuine Christian spiritual experience, the fact that local people can read a story about the real-life faith of someone who lives in the next street is important. It reinforces that Christian encounters are not for those in far-off Third World countries or for those in the history books, but that they happen to someone who they might bump into in the supermarket or the post office.

“And if people assume the Church of England is old-fashioned and out-of-date, the fact that a well-designed, modern-looking publication drops through their letterbox every month will challenge those preconceptions.”

At the end of the service, magazine editors were invited to process up to the altar. They held copies of their magazines aloft while the dean formally blessed them and the work they do.