What do we mean by everyday faith?
Most of us spend most of our time at work, at home, pursuing our hobbies and with our friends or family.
How can we live out our faith and follow God in those times, not just when we are worshipping on a Sunday?
That's what we mean when we say 'everyday faith'.
Why add an everyday faith page?
Many churches want to show how they support people to find and follow God in everyday life.
You can do this quickly and easily by adding and customising an 'everyday faith' page on your church's AChurchNearYou.com site.
Some people who are exploring the idea of coming to church find this information very interesting. For others who are already in your church community, exploring the idea of everyday faith may be something they want to do, to go deeper in their relationship with God.
What is on an everyday faith page?
Everyday faith pages contain:
- A description of what we mean by everyday faith
- A video story of someone living out their faith in everyday life (we have some you can choose from and instructions on how to record and upload your own)
- Space for information about your regular activities that support faith in the whole of life.
- Links to featured 'journeys' people can follow to explore the idea of everyday faith further. A journey is a set of digital resources on the Everyday Faith portal. The Everyday Faith portal is a separate website, it isn't part of AChurchNearYou.com.
Don’t worry if you’re not sure what to include, we provide standard content and a default featured journey. You can leave these as is and customise later if you prefer.
How do I add an everyday faith page?
We recommend you do this on a computer, not a mobile phone.
When logged in and looking at the editor menu for your church, click on 'Marketplace'.
Click or tap the toggle (in the top right hand corner of the box) next to 'Add everyday faith page'.
This will create:
- An everyday faith page in your church page list
- An everyday faith block on your homepage
When you first switch it on, the everyday faith page will contain default content. This will make sense as it is, but you will probably want to customise it.
How do I customise an everyday faith page?
In the Marketplace, on the everyday faith tile, click the button labelled 'customise page' to choose options and add in information.
If you don’t add anything, the system will use standard information that will still make sense but it is best if you customise it to your community.
Follow the instructions on the form that appears to customise the page.
Don't forget to press save at the bottom of the page when you make any changes.
What things on the page can I customise?
Here are some of the things you can do:
- Add or amend some introductory text making it clear that this page is about how our life impacts our everyday.
- Choose an everyday faith story by previewing the ones we have provided and ticking the box. If you wish to add your own paste a link from Youtube or Vimeo in the box and untick the pre-loaded story. For more information on recording similar stories, see the blog here.
- Add information about groups that you have, think about the spaces of work, home, social, and digital and what your community does to support people in their faith in those spaces.
- You might like to add contact details of someone who you choose to be the first person to contact to find out more. This might not be the incumbent and it might not be the AChurchNearYou.com editor, it’s up to you.
- Choose a journey to feature from the Everyday Faith portal. These are digital journeys of prayer and reflection delivered daily or weekly. To find out more about the portal and the journeys click here, alternatively, if you select a journey based on name, you will see a short blurb and image once you save the page. If you are not sure what to choose, it will default to the journey featured on the portal which updates regularly. You can also add a line to say why you have chosen this journey. Perhaps you think it’s a great place to start, or you are focussing on the topic collectively at present.
- Underneath the featured journey, we also preview 3 other journeys to show what else is on the portal. These change periodically. You can't edit these.
Finally hit save and check your page. Any boxes or choices left blank will either show standard content or not show.