A local church has taken an unusual approach to getting people to come along to some of its events.
People from St Canice’s Parish Church, right in the heart of Eglinton, have spent the past week knocking on every door in every street and offering a compendium of truly terrible ‘Knock Knock’ jokes.
It is an unusual way of highlighting a week of special outreach activities, according to the Rector of Faughanvale, Reverend Paul Hoey.
“We are running a week of special events entitled ‘Knock Knock!’ for everyone in the community and we reckoned that this might be a way of drawing people’s attention to it,” the Rector explained.
As well as the joke book, people have been offered an invitation to attend the events, which run from October 15-23.
“Eglinton is a growing community,” Rev Hoey said, “with very good relationships between all the local churches; but the bigger the village gets, the harder it becomes to get to know our neighbours. This is one of the aims of this week – simply to bring people together for a bit of fellowship and a bit of fun.”
A full list of activities is available on the church website www.faughanvale.derry.anglican.org.
Among those who have been enlisted to help out with the week’s activities is Paul Woodman, a Christian escapologist and illusionist from Hampshire.
Paul is the minister of a large and growing church in Southampton, and uses his tricks to help people who are puzzled by questions of faith.
He’ll be visiting schools and community venues to perform everything from the classic ‘escaping from a chained up sack’ routine to the scary ‘teacher’s arm through the guillotine’ act.
‘Knock Knock!’ Week is part of a series of activities taking place in parishes throughout the Church of Ireland Diocese of Derry and Raphoe as part of its ‘Year of Opportunity 2016’.
“It’s been a lot of work getting ready for our week,” the Rev Hoey says, “but we’re looking forward to seeing what happens. Opportunities like this don’t come along very often. And we’re determined to seize this one with both hands."
If you have a story or want to send a photo or video to us please contact the Derry Now editorial team. Between 9am and 5pm Monday to Sunday please call 028 7129 6600 for Derry City stories or 028 7774 3970 for County Derry stories. Between 5pm and midnight please call or text 07825 711978. Or you can email john.gill@derrynews.net at any time.