Case Study

All Saints Catholic Church

Denomination:: Catholic
Location:: Manassas, VA
Number of Volunteers:: 651
Scheduled Ministries:: 54 different ministries
Website:: allsaintsvachurch.org

All Saints Catholic Church, established in 1879, is a vibrant, multicultural faith community composed of both Spanish and English speaking parishioners. Each weekend they hold five English and four Spanish Masses. Lynn Pechiney, Coordinator of Liturgical Scheduling, and Javier Aguilera, Coordinator for Extraordinary Ministers of Holy Communion and the Spanish Liturgical Ministry, were excited to learn that MSP could support their bilingual ministries. “If we are one church, we should be using one system,” Lynn said. By using MSP’s Spanish Language resources, All Saints has been able to better integrate their Spanish and English services and volunteers, and reduced the time necessary for scheduling and management.

Communication

Managing Two Groups of Volunteers

Prior to using MSP, Lynn and Javier would schedule their ministries separately, building their list of volunteers individually for their specific Masses, a process that created problems. “When Javier would give me his list of ministers for the Triduum, for example, I would have no way of pulling their contact information if there were any changes in practices, and vice versa.” Lynn said. “That was a challenge for us.” There were times when quick communication with volunteers was necessary, and contacting them could be cumbersome and time-consuming.

Now that Lynn and Javier have begun managing both groups of volunteers through MSP, all important information for both groups (including schedules, contact information, etc.) could be found in a single place. It is much easier to quickly communicate with all volunteers, or filter their messages to specific groups, using MSPs Announcement Pane.

Communicating in Multiple Languages

Originally, Lynn and Javier were working separately to write communications in their respective languages, from scratch, each time. This essentially doubled the amount of time needed for every message, and introduced the opportunity for inconsistencies between instructions given to both sets of volunteers.

By customizing the MSP Web Terminal, setting up email templates through the Announcement Pane, and using volunteer custom fields and addressee filters, Lynn said she can now more easily provide information to all volunteers in both languages, and choose to send messages to specific ministries or volunteers based on their preferred language. Lynn said that MSP has helped build a stronger, singular community by making both English and Spanish translations available.

Tracking Messages

Prior to MSP, Javier used a different email program to deliver his schedules, substitute requests, and other messages. There were occasional issues with undelivered or unread emails, and he would then have to spend more time determining why his volunteers were not engaging with his sent messages.

“What I like about MSP is that I have the report of who does and does not read the emails I send. I can then call those individually who aren’t opening the messages.” Javier said. “That functionality is a big help on my end.”

Time Management

Scheduling hundreds of volunteers for months at a time is not an easy task. “I used to get all the volunteer information on paper, type it into my spreadsheet and then send that off to the person who put the schedule together,” Lynn recalled. “It would take hours and hours to put together.” For Javier, it was much the same. “The Extraordinary Minister schedule used to take three to four hours, and sometimes more depending on the number of masses,” he said. They realized this process wasn’t efficient.

Now, with the help of MSP, Lynn said a single person is able to create and publish all of their schedules, for both sets of services. The volunteer Web Terminal has been especially helpful, as it lets volunteers keep all of their preferences up-to-date, especially around the holidays or between seasons. “From my end, it’s very easy now,” said Javier. “Everything runs pretty much by itself and all I need to do is make a few tweaks.” Since MSP can create a schedule with the click of a button, taking into account all volunteers' preferences, Javier is able to spend his time on other important tasks, such as growing their ministries.

Implementation

As with any large organizational change, there was some apprehension about how MSP would be received by volunteers and ministry leaders. Would people be willing to actively participate through email, text message, and the Web Terminal? But both Lynn and Javier recognized the potential for MSP to improve their processes, and advocated for its adoption.

They started by learning as much about MSP as they could, to be prepared for any questions they might receive. And, as it turned out, an overwhelming majority of volunteers were interested in integrating MSP into the scheduling process, especially for finding substitutes and communicating their preferences. “Things were going to get much easier for everyone,” Javier shared. “For example, when a substitute was needed, they didn’t need to call me anymore. They could do it right from their phone. Little things like that started changing their mentality.” In only a short amount of time, everyone could see how MSP would improve the scheduling process for everyone.

Summary

As a bilingual church using MSP, All Saints has seen firsthand how MSP can bring their congregation closer together as a community. The entire church has seen the benefits of improving communication and organization within their ministries, thanks in large part to MSP’s support for multiple languages.. If you’re considering implementing MSP for your church, we encourage you to reach out to the MSP team for more information!

Additional Resources

Web Terminal guide in Spanish
Web Terminal video with Spanish subtitles
Multilingual setup recommendations

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