New church management software available

By JULIE KEANE, Globe staff reporter
October 30, 2003

Parishes within the diocese will have the opportunity to update and change the way they are keeping records with a new software program that will be available for parishes within the diocese.

"Currently, the diocese supports servant keeper, a software program that maintains a database for parishioners contributions and census," said Royce Ranniger, director of operations. "Over the years we have realized many short-comings with this software. Some of which are maintaining sacramental records, scheduling volunteers for the various parish ministers and pledge maintenance record-keeping."

Logos II, is a software program that enables parish users to keeps track of names, add and remove phone numbers, update members of the parish and keep track of the children who are enrolled in religious education. The program will also keep track of contributions and pledges. Logos II also has a scheduling piece that allows parishes to schedule Eucharist ministers and servers.

"Basically what we are doing is trying to help individual parishes manage information they have in a more efficient way," said Margaret Wood, information services of the diocese. "We need to be able to electronically send data."

This will enable the diocese to send and receive information from different parishes. That alone will save time for both those who are sending and those who are receiving the information.

"Parishes will not be required to switch to this software." Ranniger said. "The diocese will continue to support the servant-keeper software and as well as the Logos software."

Those parishes that would like the program will have to pay the initial cost, which is $1,400 for a single-user version and $1,650 for a multi-user version.

"$1,400 is a lot of money for a small parish, but what you are getting is so much I really think it is a very good deal," Wood added about the initial cost of the new software program.

Wood receives many calls from parishes who are interested in what the software has to offer. There also may be ways for clustered parishes to share in these costs.

Wood has been researching church-based software for years that would make the jobs of parish secretaries more efficient. She recently put together a committee of key personnel from seven parishes from around the diocese and met with them over a six-month period. During those meetings the group discussed the items that must be tracked and the information that would be nice to have.

"When we determined what we wanted, we went online and found some software packages that had that." Wood said.

Wood went on to say "the folks who took the time to serve on this committee were great to work with, their input on how a parish operated day to day was invaluable."

Ranniger commended Wood on her diligent work in finding a more efficient software that will provide parishes with information they will need on an on-going basis.

Wood will be the person that parishes will go to when they have questions regarding the new software. If she can not find the problem or answer the questions, she will call the company to find the answer.

"Basically what my job will be is to go to each parish and each cluster at a time and decide what software package they need and where they will put it. I will train and do ongoing training and initial support," Wood said.

Wood stated that the Cathedral of the Epiphany in Sioux City will be implementing the software as soon as she gets the data and they start to work together. The next parishes in line for the new software will come in late spring.

"Over the next year we will be doing instructional presentations to provide more information for parishes interested in making the transition," Ranniger said.

For more information, contact Margaret Wood at (712) 233-7515.