CiviCRM use in faith-based groups

Theatre groups, political organisations, environmental charities... CiviCRM is used by organisations of all shapes and sizes and the faith-based sector is a growing part of that. Here's a snapshot of our own Civi journey at Woodlands Church in Bristol, UK.  

We started using CiviCRM three years ago after considering various proprietary church software options. We chose Civi because of the flexibility it offered us and a skilled Drupal developer who attends the church took the project forward.

CiviCRM offers lots to faith-based organisations. Its integration with our website means that people can book onto events and courses, sign up for newsletters and keep their groups up to date. We’ve also started to record financial contributions and the new Gift Aid extension will help us to claim tax back on the gifts we receive.

There are some further areas we’d love to see developed and we’re working with UK-based Circle Interactive so that Civi can offer even more to faith-based groups and other charities. Developments we’d love to see that would benefit the whole Civi community include:

·   Recording attendance at recurring events like weekly groups and courses. This isn’t possible yet but following Civicon London a group of developers started working on an aspect of this. I hope it will become available in the coming months as many organisations will benefit from this, with so many charities running courses, classes, workshops and so on.

·   Managing volunteers and resources. It was excellent to see CiviVolunteer and CiviBooking launched at launched in London last month. We’d love to see further developments so that these new extensions can handle volunteers who serve regularly (ie every Tuesday) and bookings which are recurring (eg a weekly exercise class). Hopefully, this ability will be included as these new extensions grow and develop.

·   Civi Groups. The changing dynamics of groups can show so much – the effectiveness of a leader, the outcome of a campaign in a particular area and much more. We’ve worked on graphs to show group growth and decline and a search which shows who has joined or left a group over any timescale you choose.

·   Managing households more effectively. At Civicon I hosted a ‘Birds of a Feather’ session which highlighted some of the challenges and opportunities those of us using Civi households face. We’ve taken some steps forward but there’s still work to do on this.

One exciting aspect of using open source software is knowing that any developments you help to shape and fund benefit not only your own organisation but many others across the world. New initiatives can be shared with other Civi users via downloadable extensions and changes to the core of Civi. Knowing that motivates me to carry on when the going gets tough! 

Another encouraging aspect of CiviCRM is the community of people using it. As an end-user and implementer I was initially daunted by the tech talk and skills of others but the Civi community is friendly and welcoming whatever your role and the core team are very approachable. If issues arise you can post on the forum and others will offer advice and suggestions and point you in the right direction. Civicon is a great opportunity not just to learn more about Civi itself but to network with other people who share your interests.

Across the faith-based sector I’d love to see people sharing good practice so why not introduce yourself on the faith-based forum, contact Circle Interactive if you’re interested in trialling or contributing to a version of Civi for faith-based groups or email me on lindsey.mansfield@woodlandschurch.net  I’d love to hear from you.