Publishing

Publishing and distribution

In 2015, Bible Society Australia distributed 157,455 Bibles and New Testaments plus 193,883 Bible portions (Gospels and Children’s Bible paraphrases) and tracts (Scripture selections for occasions like Easter and Christmas). Sales of Bibles in languages other than English totalled 4,940.

Out of the Bibles sold, 70,542 were published by Bible Society Australia.

Website and digital engagement

Bible Society Australia is on its way to becoming one of the most visited Christian web presences in Australia. In 2015, we had just under one million page views, with visitors coming to hear how God is working in Australia through our Christian news service, Eternity, to find out about the work of the Bible through Bible Society around the world and to discover resources for children and young adults to help them get the most out of their Bible reading, especially around Easter and Christmas time.

Some of our most popular stories and resources featured on the Bible Society website in 2015 include:

• Our kid’s videos for Easter
• Following Jesus on death row: the conversion story of Bali 9 leader Andrew Chan
• Fifty Shades of Grey a “no-go” for Christians: sexologist

Spreading the good news: Eternity, Australia’s largest Christian newspaper

Eternity has secured a generous grant from a major philanthropic foundation to make a bold step forward into online distribution. This will involve new and exciting use of brand new technologies. During the rigorous project description process mandated by the foundation we identified a new audience and a clear strategy to connect with them.

Eternity the newspaper, being distributed in churches, has meant a strong readership among regular churchgoers. Our new online work will seek to provide material that will interest people with a looser link to Christianity and draw them closer to the Christian church. The strategy is to provide compelling shareable content that convinced Christians will pass on to their friends and online connections.

Our existing newspaper and news service had a banner year. We told great stories such as that of David Jensen, who rejected the faith of his prominent Christian family for a life of a tough man in the army, and of how this prodigal came home (read more). Shane Clifton also told his story, of being a wheelchair bound lecturer at Australia's largest Pentecostal Bible College (read more). Leading politicians debated how to recognise Aboriginal people in our Constitution (read more), and we explored the craze for adult colouring in books and the idea of "mindfulness' associated with them (read more). We told the story of how a Twitter remark by a prominent Anglican, John Dickson, that he wished Hillsong would write a song about the creed, lead to them writing just that song, “This I Believe (The Creed)”. And just this month we recorded the fact that "This I Believe" is now one the most sung songs in Australia (read more).