Documentation

🏛️ Foundations Manual

The foundations module contains features related to founding and core beliefs/principles of the church.

⛪ Churches

The Churches list shows the churches and/or branches of a parent church. Churches can be organized in a hierarchical order: a parent church can have branches (also called churches).

Church-specific entities (Person, Family, Fund, Collection, etc.) have a Church field that is used to group entities by church

Multi-Campus Access

User access is automatically limited to the church that is defined on the User document:
- System Manager: sees all records across all churches (no restriction).
- Church Manager / Church User: sees only records belonging to their assigned church.

To assign a user to a church:
1. Open the User record (with System Manager permissions).
2. Set the Church field to the desired church.
3. Save the user. A User Permission is automatically created to limit the user's access to the selected church documents.

Note: Only one root church (a church without a Parent Church) is allowed. All additional churches must be sub-churches with a Parent Church assigned.

📔Beliefs

Beliefs are the foundational principles the church stands for.

When adding church beliefs, note the following:
- For each belief, supporting Bible references can be added.

👥 People Manual

The people module contains features relating to the people of the church (i.e. Members, Families, Leadership. etc).

The People workspace contains number cards and graphs indicating the current count of people/families/members. there are also links to various reports (Birthdays, Roles, Letters, etc).

👤Person

Church people include guests, members, leadership, and other people who interact or are associated with the church.

When adding a person, note the following:
- Church membership and baptism status can be indicated.
    - If needed, additional member status types can be created.
- If the person has any roles in the church, they should be indicated in the 'Positions' section. 
   - If a position type does not exist, you can create new role types as needed.
- Photos should be added for members. The photos will be used in a member directory in a future versions.
- Letters from this person can be added in the 'Contact' tab
- If a family has been selected, the person will be displayed in the "Family Members" section on the `Family` form.
- Family relationships can be defined in the 'Family' tab.
    - When a spouse is added, the spouse's document will also be updated accordingly.
    - Additional relationships can be defined in the 'Notable Relationships' section - these relationships are not auto-updated on the other person's document.
    - A Family can be automatically created from a person by clicking the 'New Family From Person' button. This requires a 'Last Name' to be set, and will set the person as the Family's head-of-household.

To give a person access to the Church App Portal, the church person must have an associated email address. 
Click the "Invite to Portal" button on the 'Person' form to create and associate a new user with the 'Person'.
    - The user will be created with 'Church User' permissions and linked with the 'Person' (This should give the user access to their own information as well as information that is shared with them).
    - The user should receive an invitation/welcome email (assuming email settings have been setup correctly).

Visitations

Visitations are visit of a person by a church representative. 
When adding a visitation, note the following:
-  The visitation type can be changed, or new visitation types can be added.

👨‍👩‍👧‍👦Family

Families are groups of people who are related.

When adding a family, note the following:
- After adding a family, you may want to link people to the family. When a person is linked to a family, that person will be displayed in the "Family Members" list.
- Only one person can be set as the head of household. To set the head-of-household, go to the person's document and check 'Is Head of Household' on the 'Family' tab.

👥Group

Groups are collections of people with a related purpose (e.g. Sunday School classes, ministries, small groups, committees, etc.).

When adding a group, note the following:
- Check 'Public' if anyone can join the group. (Users can join public groups in the portal.)
- Check 'Show in Portal' if users should be able to see their group membership in the portal.
- Members can be added in the 'Members' section. Each member is assigned a Group Role (e.g. Leader, Member).
- A group can be linked to a Ministry via the Ministry form.

📔 Church Directory

To generate a Church Directory:
1. Navigate to People > Church Directory
2. Select which options you want for the report (The directory preview will automatically be updated after each selection):
    - Members Only: This will filter out any non-members from the directory.
    - Show Photos: This will display available photos in the directory.
    - Show Positions: This will show the person's church position under their name in the directory
    - Show Membership Status: This will show if the person's membership status next to their name.
    - Show Head of Household: This will put a star next to the person that is designated as the Family's head of household.
    - Include Birthday List: This will include a list of all the people's birthdays near the end of the directory.
    - Include Anniversary List: This will include a list of people's anniversaries near the end of the directory.
    - Include Missionaries: This will include a list of missionaries at the end of the directory. If the missionary is marked as 'sensitive', only the name, photo, and agency will be shown.
3. Click 'Print Directory' to show the print dialog. Save the file as a PDF, then print using a pdf reader like Adobe PDF/Reader to be able to print the directory as a booklet.

📨Member Transfers

Member Transfers record people transferring into or out of the church.
- Set the Direction (In/Out), the other church, and update the Status as the transfer progresses.
- A 'Letter of Transfer' can be printed from the form.

🤝Care Requests

Care Requests capture 'need help' submissions from members (meal help, hospital, grief, etc.). Members can submit them from the portal.
- When a person is selected, 'Assigned To' is pre-filled from their Care Assignment if one exists.
- New Care Request Types can be added as needed.

👥Care Assignments

Care Assignments map a person to a deacon or care-team member for a date range. An assignment is considered active while the current date falls within its start/end dates.

💰 Finances Manual

The finances module contains features related to the finances of the church.

💵Collections

A collection tracks donations from people for specific functions.

Each time a collection is taken, a New Collection should be created. When creating a new collection note the following:
- Although not required, It is recommended to link the collection to the Function in which the collection is being taken.
    - By regularly linking functions to collections, it will be possible later to run reports to see collection amounts for specific function types, etc.
- Remember: After saving a collection, it will be in a draft state. In order to finalize the collection, you will need to 'Submit' the collection. Once submitted, it cannot be modified unless you cancel and amend it.
    - See the 'Terminology' section in the Getting Started guide for more information about document states (draft / submitted / cancelled / amended / etc).
- After submitting the collection, you can click the Bank Reconciliation Report button on the top right of the form. This report can be used to compare with bank deposit reports.

The Finances workspace, contains links to view the collection list and various collection reports.

🤲Donations

A donation tracks the amount given from a person toward a church fund. For tracking monies given to people in need, see Alms below.

When adding donations to a collection, note the following:
- After entering each donation, the collection total and fund totals will be updated in real-time.
- If a single donation check specifies multiple funds, enter it as two separate donations (one for each fund).
- Additional payment types can be added if needed.
- When entering a donation from a specific person (i.e. Check donation or Cash Envelope), it is highly recommended to link the donation to the person.
   - By regularly linking donations to persons, end-of-year statements and individual person donation reports can be created.

The Finances workspace, contains links to view donation reports. 

📊Funds

Funds are used by churches to tag monies for a specific purpose. Some default funds are included (i.e. General, Building, Missions, etc), but additional funds can be created for your own purposes.

When adding/managing a fund, note the following:
- Any collections that contained donations the the fund will be listed in the 'Transactions' section at the bottom of the fund form.
- Manual transactions can created for the fund if needed
    - If the transaction is a transfer between funds, then create a fund transfer instead. Fund transfers automatically add a transaction to the fund.
    - If the transaction is documenting an church expense, add an expense instead. By choosing the expense type, an associated fund transaction will automatically be created. 

The Finances workspace, contains links to view fund reports along with a graph showing the current totals in each fund.

💸Expenses

Expenses are any transaction that requires an outflow of funds. 

When creating an expense, note the following:
- An expense type must be chosen. If needed, you can create a new expense type.

Expense Types

Expense types are used to categorize different expenses. This allows for more fine-grained financial reporting.

When creating an expense type, note the following:
- Each expense type is linked to a specific fund, so that when expenses of this type are created, a transaction for the related fund will also automatically be created.
- Expense types can be grouped in hierarchies. For example, you could have an expense type group of 'Waste' and then have sub-types of 'Trash' and 'Recycling'.
    - In the example above, the 'Waste' expense type would have the 'group' option checked and the 'Trash' and 'Recycling' expense types would have 'Waste' selected as the 'Parent Expense Type'.

🫴Alms

Alms are monies given by the church to someone in need. For giving to the church, see Donations above.

When creating an alms request, note the following:
- The Recipient is the person (or family) who would receive the alms
- Once the alms request is Approved or Declined, the Status field should be updated.
- Once the alms have been distributed to the Recipient:
    - The Status can be set to Distributed.
    - An associated Expense can be created by clicking the Create Expense button at the top-right of the form. This will create and submit an Expense and automatically reduce the Fund associated with that Expense.

📊Budgets

Budgets track expected expenses vs actual expenses over a given time period.

When creating a budget, note the following:
- The total budget field will auto-update after adding new budget lines
- Each budget line consists of an expense type and an budgeted amount
- Notes can be added for each budget line

Clicking 'View' -> 'Budget vs Actual' will show a report comparing the budgeted amounts verses the actual amounts spent for each expense type listed in the budget.

🏪Vendors

Vendors are payees for Expenses.
- Set a Default Expense Type so it auto-fills when the vendor is chosen on an expense.
- Optionally record an address and contact details. A vendor's expenses appear in the 'Connections' section of its form.

🤝 Ministries Manual

The ministries module contains features related to functions and specific ministries of the church.

🗓️Functions

Church functions are used to track attendance and for linking to other documents.

When creating a function, note the following:
- Default function types are provided, but additional function types can be created.
    - When creating a function type, you can choose an existing function as a 'template function'. This will allow you to click the 'Fill From Template' button when creating this type of function in the future to fill in most of the function details using the template function's values.
- Other documents can be linked as items in the function's schedule (i.e. Songs, Sermons, People, Bible References, etc)
- Attendance can be tracked (Additional attendance types can be added if needed)
    - To pre-populate attendance for a function, you can select a 'template function' in the related function type. Then clicking the 'Fill From Template' button will pre-populate all attendance records from the template function.
- To publish a function to the public website, check the 'Publish' checkbox.

The Ministries workspace includes links to function and attendance reports.

Hint: in the Function list view, change the view type to 'Calendar' to view the Functions on a calendar.

🔁Recurring Functions

A function can recreate itself automatically on a schedule (e.g. a weekly Bible Study). Once an occurrence's end date/time passes, the next one is created with the same schedule, attendance roster, associations, and other template details.

To enable recurrence on a Function:
- Expand the Recurrence section and check Automatically Recreate.
- Choose a Repeat Frequency (Daily, Weekly, Monthly, or Yearly), and (where applicable) the day of week or day of month.
- Optionally set a Repeat Until date to stop creating new occurrences after that date.
- Uncheck Automatically Recreate at any time to stop generating new occurrences.
Tip: open a Ministry and click Create Recurring Function to start a new recurring function pre-linked to that ministry. Each ministry's Recurring Functions list shows all of the recurring functions associated with the ministry.

📝Function Sign-Ups

Function sign-ups allow people to indicate their intent to attend a function and optionally bring/complete specific items.

When creating a sign-up, note the following:
- Only Functions that have Allow Sign-Ups enabled will be available in the 'Function' field.
- Each person can only have one sign-up per function.
- The Attending checkbox indicates whether the person plans to attend.
    - Checking this will automatically add an attendance record to the Function with a status of: 'Signed-Up'
    - Unchecking this will remove any attendance record for the Person from the Function
- If the Function has sign-up items defined, you can add rows to indicate which (and how many of those) items you will bring/complete.
    - The Signed Up quantity on each item in the Function document will automatically update to reflect the total quantity indicated in sign-ups.

📦Sign-Up Items

Sign-up items represent things that are needed for a function (e.g. food, supplies, jobs, etc). They are added to a function's Sign-Up Items table with the quantity needed. As people submit sign-ups and indicate they will bring specific items, the Quantity Signed Up on the function is automatically totaled across all sign-ups and displayed on the Function document.

✅Function Check-Ins

Function check-ins are a record that a person has physically arrived at a function.

When creating a check-in, note the following:
- Each person can only be checked in once per function.
- Upon saving, the person's attendance record on the function will automatically be set to Checked-In.
- Deleting a check-in will remove the associated Checked-In attendance record from the function.

Bulk Check-In
1. Open the Person list view.
2. Select (Check) the people you would like to check-in.
3. Click `Actions -> Check In`
4. Choose which Function for which you would like to check the people in.
The people's attendance will be tracked in the Function document.

🎵Songs

Songs can be added as items to a church function.
Note: there is not currently a way to present a song. This is planned in future versions.

When creating a song, note the following:
- If you know the CCLI number for the song, you can add it. This may be used in future enhancements.
- You can add any number of slides to a song.
- After creating a song, you may want to add it to a function's schedule.

🗂️Counseling Cases

Counseling Cases are confidential case files (restricted to Church Manager).
- Record the person, counselor, summary, and status.
- Each meeting is logged as a row in the 'Sessions' table.
- New Case Types can be added as needed.

🌍 Missions Manual

The missions module contains features related to missions outreach of the church.

📣Missionaries

Missionaries that the church supports.

When adding a new missionary, note the following:
- If applicable, link an associated Missionary Agency. This can be used to group missionaries in reports or on the missions webpage.
- Adding a photo is recommended. In future versions, the photo may be displayed on the public missionary webpage.
- Prayer letters (or other letters) can be added to the 'Letters to the Church' section. Prayer letters may be displayed on the missions webpage in future versions.
- Other documents can be linked to the Missionary in the 'Related Documents' section (i.e. People, Events, Collections, etc).

The Missions workspace contains links to Missionary Letter reports.

🏢Missionary Agencies

Missionary Agencies are often used by Missionaries for support & guidance.

When adding a missionary agency, note the following:
- It is recommended to add the agency logo since this may be displayed on the public facing missions webpage.

🙏 Prayers Manual

The prayers module helps gather, track and manage prayers and prayer requests.

The Prayer workspace contains links to prayer reports and documents.

🙇Prayer Request

Prayer requests are made by (and prayed for) by church people. Prayer requests can also be submitted via users on the site or anonymously via a web form.

When adding a prayer request, note the following:
- Additional prayer request statuses can be created if needed.
- Additional prayer request types can be created if needed.
- If the request is for a specific person, select the person.
- If the request should not be shared with the church, check the 'Is Private' box. These requests will only be visible by Managers & Users of the Church app.

🤲Prayers

Prayers are offered by church people. Prayers may be related to prayer requests.

When adding a prayer, note the following:
- Select the person who is saying the prayer.
- A file can be attached if the prayer is a written or recorded prayer.
- Items that were prayed for can be recorded in the 'Prayer Topics' section.
    - Topics can include anything stored in the system (i.e. People, Events, Missionaries, Prayer Requests, etc).
    - Choose the topic type (i.e. Prayer Request), then choose the specific document of that type.

📖 Study Manual

The study module contains features relating to the study of the Bible, sermons, and other learning material.

📚Bible Books

The books of the Bible along with abbreviations. These are used when creating Bible Verses or Bible References.

Books of the Bible can be modified by users with the 'Church Manager' role.

🈚Translations

Translations of the Bible. Each translation has a name, and abbreviation.

When managing translations, note the following:
- By default, only users with the 'Church Manager' permission can modify translations.
- The abbreviation is used when fetching the text of a Bible reference.

🔠Bible Verse

A Bible verse is a Book, Chapter, and Verse combination that represents a single verse in the Bible. A range of Bible verses makes a Bible Reference.

When adding a Bible verse, note the following:
- If you have an internet connection the 'chapter' and 'verse' dropdown fields should limit you to actual valid chapters/verses, however without an internet connection, the chapter field will only be limited to 1-150 and verses will only be limited to 1-176. This could allow you to choose an invalid chapter/verse combination.

📖Bible Reference

A Bible reference is a range of Bible verses.

When adding a Bible reference, note the following:
- Only a start-verse is required
- To 'Import Reference Text' you must have a 'Start Verse' and 'Translation' selected. 
    - Reference text is imported from bible.helloao.org which supports most public domain translations and those with permissive licenses.
    - If no text is fetched, it is likely that the translation you are trying to fetch text for is copyrighted and therefore restricted under copyright. We recommend using public domain versions like the BSB which have absolutely zero restrictions on the Word of God - and are not used for profit by the copyright holders.
    - An internet connection is required to 'Import Reference Text'

🧠Bible Memory

The Bible Memory feature in the portal provides an interface for users to memorize Scripture. Each person has a personalized list  which tracked as Bible Memory Items, and every completed practice run is logged as a Memory Session.

Memorizing on the Portal

From the portal menu, click "Bible Memory"

Create a Memory Goal:
- Click + Add passage to pick a Book, Translation, Chapter, and verse range. The portal links to, or creates an associated Bible Reference (and fetches the verse text from bible.helloao.org) automatically.
- Select "Hide memorized" to filter out already memorized verses.

Memory Modes:
- Use "Blur" mode to become familiarize with the reference text.
    - Click "+ Increase Blur" to blur out a few words at a time.
    - When finished, click "Done" to increase memory progress by 5% (99% Maximum - 'Type' mode must be used to increase memorization % to 100.
- Use the "Type" mode to type the first letter of each word.
    - A perfect run (zero mistakes) awards 50% progress and increments the "perfect runs" counter
    - Under three mistakes awards 10% toward the memorization progress.
    - Mistakes subtract 2% progress for each mistake.

Assigning References to Users for Memorization

Church Managers can push a Bible Reference into one or more users' memory lists. This is useful for weekly memory verses or small-group assignments.

From the Bible Reference list view:
1. Select one or more Bible references.
2. Open the Actions menu and choose 'Assign to User for Memorization' or 'Assign to Group for Memorization'.
3. Pick the User, or pick a Group for assignment. When a Group is chosen, every person in the group is assigned the reference for memory.

Notes on assignment:
- Each assignment creates a Bible Memory Item stamped with Assigned By, which shows up under the reference on the recipient's Bible Memory list.
- If a passage is already in the user's list, the assignment is skipped.
- When assigning to a Group, if the Person record has no linked 'App User' listed, a follow-up dialog will be displayed showing which persons don't have user accounts yet.
- When assigning to a User, if a person is not available, that means the person has not been invited to the portal yet and doesn't have a linked User account (i.e. they don't have an account to log into the portal).

Reporting

The Bible Memory report lists memory progress across all users, with filters for Memorized (Yes/No/all) and a specific User. The References Memorized card on the Study workspace tracks total memorizations over time.

📝Sermons

A Sermon is a collection of slides that can be presented at a church event. Each sermon has a title, an optional 'Prepared By' field linking to a Person, and optional notes.

When creating a sermon, note the following:
- Add slides to the 'Slides' table to build your sermon content. Each slide references a document (e.g. a Bible Reference)
- For each slide, you can select which fields from the linked document to show on the slide.
  - You may choose a field to use as the slide title by checking the 'Title' box.
  - If no fields are selected, the slide will show the linked document's name as the title.
- The 'Presentation History' table tracks when and where the sermon has been presented, who presented it, and optionally includes a recording of the sermon.

Presenting a Sermon

To present a sermon, click the 'Present' button on the sermon document:
- Use the arrow keys, or spacebar to navigate between slides.
- Press Escape or click the `X` button to exit the presentation.

Example Workflow

1. The Pastor creates a new Sermon and adds slides referencing Bible References, Beliefs, Songs, etc.
2. He adds additional per-slide notes to be displayed in the presentation and general sermon notes that are private (not presented).
3. On Sunday, he clicks 'Present' to display the sermon.
4. After the service, a row is added to 'Presentation History' table with the date, presenter, location, and optionally an audio/video recording of the sermon.

✉️ Communications Manual

The communications module contains features related to personal interactions within (and without) the church.

📝Letters

Letters received by the church from church people or missionaries can be added to the relevant person or missionary for archival or reference purposes.

When adding a letter to a person or missionary, note the following:
- Check the 'Is Private' checkbox if the letter is not to be displayed publicly.
    - Missionary letters will be displayed on the public 'missions' website page unless this checkbox is checked!
- If the letter should be shared with the church, check the 'Share with Church?' checkbox
    - Once the letter is shared, the 'Shared Date' field should be updated
    - The Letters To Be Shared With Church report will show all letters that should be, and have not yet been shared with the church.

Example Workflow:
1. Missionary Mike sends a prayer letter that he would like read to the church.
2. The Church Secretary receives the letter, navigates to `Missions > Missionaries > Missionary Mike > Letters to the Church` and adds the letter to the Missionary Mike document making note that the letter should be read to the church.
3. Before the next church service, the Pastor runs the `Missions > Missionary Letters` report and filters by 'Share w/ Church` to see which letters need to be read.
4. The letters are added to the `Event Schedule` for the next `Function` (Service).
5. Missionary Mike's `Missionary` document can be updated with a date to show that the letter was read to the church.

🖥️Presentations

Presentations are collections of digital media slides that may be presented at a church event.
Note: there is not currently a way to actually 'present' a presentation. For more advanced use-cases we recommend FreeShow.

When creating a presentation, note the following:
- Add as many slides as needed containing the content you would like to display.
- You may want to add the presentation as an item in a church event's schedule.

✉️Email Groups

Email groups can be setup for sending out newsletters. 

An email group can be created two main ways:
- Manually Create an Email Group and Add Email Group Members.
- Alternatively, open an existing person Group and choose 'Actions -> Create Email Group'

When an email group is created, Newsletters can be sent to these groups.

🔧 Operations Manual

The operations module contains features related to the operation of the church (maintenance, assets, etc).

📦Assets

Property of the church.

When adding a new asset, note the following:
- Try to give the asset a short but descriptive title
- Additional details can be added in the 'Notes' field
- The location of the asset can be set (or added) in the "Location" field.

📍 Location

A location is any physical or virtual space where something can reside.

When adding a new location, note the following:
- Locations can be set as a 'group'. This will allow other locations to be 'grouped' under this location.
- Locations can be linked to an address. When linked the map will update accordingly.
- Shapes/drawings can be added to the map view for reference purposes (i.e. circle an area in an open space)

✅Tasks

Items that need to be completed. (Like a checklist or todo-list)

When adding a new task, note the following:
- To add sub-tasks, check the 'Is Group' option, then create new tasks and select the 'group' task in the 'Parent Task' field.
- ⚠️ Assigning a person is only for documentation purposes, no additional 'reminder' or 'notification' functionality exists yet.

📝Meeting Minutes

Meeting Minutes record board or committee meetings.
- Optionally link the related Function.
- List who was present in the 'Attendees' table and write the record in the 'Minutes' field.
- Set 'Approved On' once the minutes are approved.

🌐 Website Manual

The website module consists of two main features: a public website, and a user portal.

🌎Website

The public facing website is accessible by anyone and can be dynamically updated based on information in the Church App (i.e. Beliefs, Missionaries, Ministries, etc).
User accounts with "Church Manager" permissions can modify the website by editing the website settings and publishing documents.
No user account is required to view the website - anyone with an internet connection and a web browser can view the public website.

👤User Portal

The user portal requires login credentials and provides users a personalized interface for accessing church information relevant to their account (i.e. Personal Profile, Prayer Requests, Alms Requests, Function Sign-Ups, etc).
Portal users cannot access all information in the Church App, they can only access information related to their 'Person', or information shared with them (i.e. non-private prayer requests).