Like most magazines, CHRISTIANITY TODAY has a pretty stringent policy when it comes to unsolicited manuscripts: We rarely use them. We even ask that writers not send them. (Query letters, of course, are always welcome.)
The reason for such a policy is simple. It saves the writer from sending a completed text on a subject that CT may already have handled, is in the process of handling, or is simply not interested in. And it saves our editors time for concentrating on the development of assigned articles scheduled for coming issues.
But no matter how good our intentions (nor how many times we spell that policy out on our masthead), upwards of 700 unsolicited manuscripts are logged by editorial assistant Sue Mole each year, and then passed to editors for their three-to four-week turnaround. That means that in the past three years, some 2,000-plus articles have come in “over the transom.” And of those, only five or six have seen the light of day as a department (like Speaking Out) or an article.
One such “odds beater” is this month’s cover story by Galen Meyer. Actually, “Easter on Hill 17” was at first rejected, only to be read later by another editor who immediately began to champion its publication. And a cover story was born.
As for that stringent manuscript policy, it remains the same: “Unsolicited articles are not accepted.” Usually.
HAROLD SMITH, Managing Editor
