The Lutheran has again been recognised by the Australasian Religious Press Association (ARPA), receiving three honours in the 2021 ARPA awards.
Our churchwide magazine won a gold award for Best Profile Story, a silver award in the Best Faith Reflection category and completed the set with a bronze award in the Best News Story category. The gold award recognised the work of journalist and volunteer contributor Helen Beringen for the Going GREYT column on the Lutheran Community Sewing Group, published in the October 2020 edition under the title ‘A stitch in time builds lives’. The judges said: ‘This article deserves first place for a number of reasons: it clearly fulfils the stated aim of the article, describing with clarity the origin, purpose, method of operation, and people involved in the Lutheran Community Sewing Group; it describes and quotes from the people involved in such a way that they are appealing; [and] the activities of the group are presented so that they are inspirational and encouraging.’
The Lutheran received its silver award for Pastor Reid Matthias’s piece on social isolation entitled ‘Social Dis-connection’. The judges said of the faith reflection from the June 2020 edition: ‘Story-telling is the hallmark of Christian teaching … This article takes less than five minutes to read but its reward is in the message of real connection it will leave you.’ The Lutheran‘s bronze award came for Editor Lisa McIntosh’s story ‘Love amid bushfire crises’, published in February 2020.
Linda Macqueen, LCA Communications Manager and former editor of The Lutheran, said the magazine’s continuous peer recognition over several decades is testament to its ability to adapt to changing reader expectations. ‘It’s a challenging time to steer a publication that relies on subscriptions to survive’, she said. ‘It’s immensely rewarding to receive even one award from this community of professional editors and writing; to pick up three, including a gold, is something all of us in the LCANZ can be proud of.’
ARPA’s premier annual honour, The Gutenberg Award, was this year won by Zadok Perspectives and Papers, the flagship publication of Ethos: EA Centre for Christianity & Society. The Lutheran won The Gutenberg Award in 2011.
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