There are three primary goals you should keep in mind as you think about creating (or updating) your church website: (1) be hospitable to guests, (2) increase feelings of belonging for members, and (3) make it easy for anyone to give online at any time.


Above all, be hospitable to guests, seekers, and newcomers.

The two most important questions to answer clearly on your church website are: where is the church and what time is worship? That information along with your contact information  should be accessible from (if not explicitly on!) every page of your website. Other considerations in meeting the goal of being hospitable to guests, seekers, and newcomers are listed below.

  • If you’ll ever have non-standard worship times (think Holy Week, Christmas, summer schedules, etc.), that information needs to be prominently displayed and must be included in each place that service times are listed. Think of how inhospitable it would be to a guest or newcomer who saw your worship times on your website and showed up only to find locked doors and an empty church because you have an odd Sunday with a different meeting time!

  • Make sure the contact information you provide is current and monitored regularly. If your phone number is only answered between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m. Monday - Wednesday, say so in each place you’ve included your phone number. Same thing with your email address! If you have a contact form, make sure it’s functioning properly and that the inbox associated with entries on that form is monitored regularly. 

  • Your church’s social media presence is part of your contact information. Guests and newcomers can learn a lot about your community through your social media presence beyond the facts like location and service time, so be sure to link to those resources clearly.

  • Include clear images of the exterior of your church (preferably with people in them, too!) so people know they’ve made it to the right place.

  • Make sure to address what the parking situation is at your church! Street parking? A lot out back? Are there visitors’ spots? Is there a specific entrance people should use?

  • Be clear about how children will be welcomed in your church. Are the wiggles of littles welcome in your nave during the worship service? Is there a nursery? Is there Sunday school? Are there offerings for tweens and teens? Even if there aren’t children in your church at this time, you still need to be clear about what welcome awaits families with kiddos.

  • Is your church easily accessible for people with mobility-related disabilities? If not, you must make that clear on your website. If I am a wheelchair user and I won’t be able to use the restroom at your church, I need to know that before I arrive so that I can make an informed choice. (BTW - if your church isn’t fully accessible, check out this post about resources to help your building become fully accessible and hospitable.

  • Churches are known for having their own, unique cultures that create a feeling of being othered for guests and newcomers. Don’t make people feel like outsiders! If you don’t have recordings of services embedded on your website, you should be sure to explicitly address the issues below. Newcomers and guests will want to know:

    • What to expect from a worship service. Keep in mind that not everyone is familiar with Anglican worship style and that even among Episcopal churches there are variations on themes in customs and practices.

    • What kind of clothing should they wear to fit in. Your parish may truly be welcoming enough that anyone in any clothing would be warmly welcomed, but people still want to fit in and not look like an outsider. Social anxiety about fitting in, even as a guest passing through a town, is a real issue and can make the difference between someone being able to worship with their full self and someone feeling uncomfortable and disconnected through a service. 


Encourage pride and increase feelings of belonging
for members.

Although your current members are not your primary audience, your website should reflect the unique charisms and vibrancy of your parish. When your members access your website, they should be able to feel proud that their community is represented well and authentically.

All of your “insider baseball” content for members (think serving schedules, membership directory, etc.) should not live on pages of your website because that’s information that (1) gets outdated quickly and increases the risk of having stale content hidden on your site, (2) may need to be kept private to avoid scammers getting parishioner data, and (3) is not something that your primary audience of visitors and newcomers would need. Consider instead using a free resource like a Google Drive folder (to which you can manage access through share settings) for that information and instead having a link to that folder for your members on your website. Not sure if it should be on the website or not? A good decision filter question is, “Would a new person in my town need to know this to be able to be welcomed on Sunday, confident in their impression of who we are?” If the answer is no, keep it off site!


Make online giving simple.

Given the reality that fewer and fewer people are carrying cash and even fewer carry checkbooks, online giving is really no longer optional for churches that want to make it easy for people to give to and be included in their ministries. Online giving is essential for members and guests alike. Remember that giving is an act of worship, not some kind of admittance fee for a worship service. It should be easy for guests and newcomers to give during your service if they choose to so that they can participate fully in worship.