Agenda for Pastors/Ministers/Clergy/Rabbis, etc

I am quickly discovering the uses of Agenda for pastors is remarkable. We have so many committees, announcements, projects, etc to keep track of in our vocation. I am evening considering using Agenda to create projects for each parishoner to record information and interactions. Although, password protection and security would be necessary for such sensitive information.

I am considering how I can recommend this to my colleagues. I have used dozens of programs since I started using a a Mac in 2006 and, so far, Agenda is the best application I have ever come across to fit the multiple needs of pastors (who’s work load is often a cross between middle management/CEO, especially for solo pastors like myself who work full time.)

I realize religious vocations are generally looked down upon in the IT (STEM world), and the developers may see us as one of the least likely professions to take advantage of this program to the point of seeing our embrace as a determine, but this application has completely turned my workflow upside down in a remarkable way.

An iOS program would make this a complete system for any pastor. When such an app is released, I am considering starting a blog showing how Agenda may be used to organzie the super chaotic life of a full-time pastor.

I would like to thank the developers for this amazing application. Please release the iOS app as soon as possible!

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Wow, that’s a great story of Agenda usage. I love it when someone comes from a completely unexpected direction.

Your explanation of the work a pastor undertakes makes it completely clear why Agenda would be useful in that field.

The iOS app is our top priority. We are working on it now, and it should not be too long. Promised for the first half of 2018.

Thanks for sharing!

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Brilliant indeed, thanks for sharing!

I realize religious vocations are generally looked down upon in the IT (STEM world), and the developers may see us as one of the least likely professions to take advantage of this program to the point of seeing our embrace as a determine, but this application has completely turned my workflow upside down in a remarkable way.

One fun fact is that also Papers was fairly popular among those with religious vocations :smiley: In all seriousness, I guess it also shows that an app specifically aimed at this profession would likely not even be what you’d want as the variety of things you deal with is so large. Glad to hear Agenda works so well for you!

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This is such an interesting read - I had no idea how varied a pastor’s work can be! Hope you’re loving the iOS app as much as I am :blush:

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I was a computer programmer for 25 years before God moved me into full time ministry. I am always looking for the best tech to keep me on top of the phone calls, visits, meetings, teachings and counseling. I am new to Agenda and hope that it can be a centralized repository for many of these things. One thing that it needs is a quick entry on the phone. People are always giving me random information and I need to open my phone and quickly find a place to put that information. Apple notes is currently the quickest app to open and start typing.

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I have Agenda on my phone’s Favourites bar so it’s always just a click away, & right after my goals at the very top of the Categories I have #Inbox where I put random info. It’s never more than 2 clicks away, & I find it an ideal place to put anything I haven’t time to process straight away. Being in plain sight whenever I open Agenda also means I don’t forget to deal with it or file it somewhere later :blush:

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My agenda seems to open to the “on agenda” screen which has the latest post at the top. I see what you are saying and will create the category and see how it works. Thanks

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Continuing the discussion from Agenda for Pastors/Ministers/Clergy/Rabbis, etc:

@speakingthesobertrut
Did you start a blog about using Agenda? My husband and I are full time pastors and have just learned about Agenda. We would love to see some ideas for how to tweak this app to use in our calling.
Thank You!

I did not for a specific reason. Agenda began to lock up on my MacBook pro and stopped working. It would also not sync. The developers have been working very diligently trying to figure out why I was having this problem. I’ve been using Macs since 1992, and I received more feedback from the Agenda team regarding my issues than I ever have in working with a developer. One solution that was floated and I finally pulled the trigger on was restarting from scratch, because the problem very well may have been on my side.

Regarding using the program for pastoral work, it worked splendidly until it didn’t. A few examples:

  1. I had a project devoted to my notes for my monthly pastor’s report. This was very easy to maintain, and I simply printed out the report for my monthly board meeting with the church.

  2. I created a category for Parishioners and had each parishioner as a project. If I had a significant interaction with a parishioner, then I would detail it in a note and put the date as the title. This enable me to review relevant data before a meeting with a parishioner and also enabled me to go through the projects and see which parishioners had been “neglected” for want of a better word.

If you are still interested, I have some more examples related to normal church projects, committees, agendas for committees, announcements, newsletter material, etc.

Before it bugged out, Agenda had become the central place for my pastoral workflow throughout the day/week.

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BTW, as I said in the post above, I reset the program after moving all the data into other programs. I will be more cautious this time, but so far, the reset worked and everything is working as it should. I know the developers are continuing to improve the program, so I hope to once again make it my central workflow area, because, and I say this with no compensation from the Agenda people, this program worked better than any program I ever used for my own workflow–and I’ve used countless programs/apps in my pastoral ministry over the past 15 years.

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