Jun
30
Written by:
host
6/30/2009 7:00 AM
One of the projects I'm working on is a faith formation website for the Iowa Conference of the United Methodist Church. When it is finished, the site will contain information about the many faith formation / Christian education ministries of the conference, with content created by many leaders from around the state. So that I don't have to do all of the work myself, I chose to create the website (which you can preview here) using a Content Management System.
According to Wikipedia, a Content Management System, or CMS, is a "computer application used to manage work flow needed to collaboratively create, edit, review, index, search, publish, and archive various kinds of digital media and electronic text." Put more simply, a CMS is a website creation tool that typically resides online rather than on your hard drive.
The greatest benefit of a CMS-based website is the ability to have multiple persons who are the approved editors of the site or a portion thereof. So, for example, all of the staff members of a church could have access to any pages relating to their ministry responsibilities, and could add or change content as necessary. Team leaders could also be given password-protected access to certain pages, too.
Some of the other benefits of a CMS is that the software is often available for free, is easy to learn to use, and is easily extensible (that is, additional functionality can be gradually added to the site as needed.)
There are many CMS solutions available, but these 4 are my recommendations for those just starting to explore this possibility for their ministry setting:
- WordPress is a popular blogging software that can function much like a CMS, especially when used along with a really good "theme" or skin.
- Joomla is extremely popular and fairly easy to use, and it often is available as part of your web hosting package with a one-click install. The site I mentioned earlier is being built using Joomla.
- DotNetNuke is a very powerful but easy to learn system. It's not as easy to install and won't run on most web servers, so I recommend using the services of our own church website provider, WebMedley.
- A number of companies have created their own proprietary CMS that they then market to churches. One I have used extensively and (mostly) like is FaithWebsites.
There are plenty of other options, such as Gawker, TypePad, Plone, Drupal, and Moveable Type. Every one has advantages and disadvantages, so do your homework or consult a professional. The bottom line is that a CMS-based website can be a great way for your congregation to have a website with easy-to-create, non-static (i.e. regularly changing) content, something I highly recommend!
~Tim Gossett