Episcopal Publications Win Top Awards From Associated Church Press
Episcopal News Service. May 4, 1995 [95081]
(ENS) Episcopal and Anglican publications won some of the top awards in the 1994 Associated Church Press (ACP) competition. ACP is an ecumenical organization representing almost 200 publications in the U.S. and Canada.
In the awards ceremony at the ACP's annual meeting in Ottawa -- a joint convention with the Canadian Church Press -- the Virginia Episcopalian, edited by Sarah Bartenstein, won first place among 47 entries in the category for regional newspapers. The Episcopal Times of the Diocese of Massachusetts, edited until recently by Jay Cormier, won second place.
In the category for national or international newspapers, Anglican Journal, the monthly paper for the Anglican Church of Canada edited by Carolyn Purden, won first place. Third place went to the Episcopal Church's national newspaper, Episcopal Life, edited by Jerrold Hames.
Among denominational general interest magazines, Cathedral Age, published at the Washington National Cathedral, won third place and The Witness, an Episcopal Church publication edited by Jeanie Wylie-Kellermann, won third place among special interest magazines.
- The Witness, an award of excellence (first place) for a feature article by Ken Sehested and an award of excellence in the category of readers' favorite for an issue on women's spirituality;
- Episcopal News Service, award of excellence for Jeffrey Penn's article on the first ordination of women in the Church of England;
- Anglican Advance, newspaper for the Diocese of Chicago edited by David Skidmore, and the Virginia Episcopalian tied for the award of excellence for their coverage of the 1994 General Convention.
Among the awards for graphics and photography, Trinity News, the magazine for Trinity Church of Wall Street, won an award of merit for best redesign; Anglican Advance won an award of excellence and Episcopal Life an award of merit for best newspaper front page; Episcopal Life also won the award of excellence for newspaper graphics. Episcopal Church publications also won a number of honorable mentions.
The awards contest drew almost a thousand entries from 83 publications.
Society is currently caught in an unprecedented period of rich spirituality that shows no signs of diminishing, the Rev. Herbert O'Driscoll of Vancouver said in his keynote address. At the same time, he said, the institutional forms of religion are writhing in agony, riddled with timidity, caution and mistrust. "As church journalists, you face an ironic reality -- at the time that the church is hunkering down, it needs richer links with the rest of the Christian family and an awareness of the deeper cultural context in which it seeks to minister," he said.
"We are going through an extraordinary period of institutional pain" in which the twin pillars of our civilization -- materialism and rationalism -- are crumbling and people are looking for alternatives," O'Driscoll added. "Every single institution in Western society is in deep agony and yet, at the heart of it, they have never been better or stronger."
While the church press is "a creature of the institutional church and therefore part of a large, dysfunctional family from which it can't escape," O'Driscoll argued it must play the role of physician to the whole church without losing its sense of integrity.
The Rev. Joe Roos, publisher of Sojourners magazine in Washington, D.C., was turned back at the Canadian border when he admitted to immigration authorities that he had been convicted of illegally praying in front of the White House to protest U.S. involvement in the Persian Gulf War. After the ACP board strongly protested the action with Canadian authorities, Roos was granted a "ministerial permit" to fly back to Ottawa and was elected to a two-year term as president, succeeding James Solheim of Episcopal News Service.
The 130 convention participants were offered a wide array of workshops, many of which explored new computer technology and the information superhighway. Several others dealt with reporting on conflict in the church. Members of Canada's Parliament also addressed a plenary session on the continuing independence movement in the province of Quebec.