The Grapevine, the parish magazine of St Luke’s, Burton Stone Lane, York, is celebrating 50 issues since it was launched to serve the community in 2001. Mark Comer of St Lukes writes:
Grapevine is 50! Not 50 years old, but this issue is the 50th since it was launched to serve the community in the Parish of St Luke’s, Burton Stone Lane, in 2001.
A group at St Luke’s got together that year to see if the church could meet the need for news and community information in the streets around the Lane. A good number of titles were thrown out before settling on Grapevine; a grapevine is a way of exchanging news, views and gossip, and as it happens it’s appropriate for a church too because Jesus says “I am the true vine and you are the branches” in St John’s Gospel.
Over the 13 years much midnight oil has been burned producing Grapevine and a lot of shoe leather used up distributing it.
Steve Benford, St Luke’s Vicar from 2004 until October this year, was often to be seen delivering Grapevine with his dogs.
Local businesses, schools, community organisations and the police are all very supportive and see the value of a small magazine serving a small locality, while St Luke’s is more than happy to fund and manage Grapevine.
Some of Grapevine’s most memorable moments over the years have involved setting up its distinctive cover pictures, usually taken by me. Father Christmas has been seen on a bench outside the church in October (and been interviewed too); children have been force-fed Easter eggs almost before New Year’s Day is out; and in order to get ten lords a-leaping in 2004 they dressed up and did just that on Shipton Street.
Grapevine is in good heart for the future thanks to a lot of work by a few individuals and the moral and financial support of St Luke’s congregation.