Christian blog about church website design

I have decided some time ago to provide here, for free, a collection of church WordPress themes so everybody willing to start a church blog based on WordPress to find some free themes to design his blog. It is not difficult, our church WordPress themes are designed in such a way that all you need to do is to copy them to the folder where your themes are located, in wp-content/themes folder on your WordPress installation folder.

Than, after logging in to your administration account of your blog go to presentation or design tab, depending on your WordPress version and  change the current theme to the church WordPress theme you have downloaded from our website.

After this, you are allowed to change it as much as you want, in order to fit your church design: you can change colors, you can change pictures and of course, you can and you need to change text. You actually need to add text as often as possible on your church blog, so people visit it often.

It is that easy to have a nice church WordPress blog based on one of our themes!

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I was reading a few days ago about forums not being too “Web 2.0″, not being in “trend”. Well, is it? Or to discuss it focused on our niche: are Christian forums still a real presence in this continuously evolving internet environment?

In my opinion, nothing will change this. Christian forums and any forum, after all, put people with common interests together. I think that no matter how many social networks or blogs you have, a forum will still be preferred for some actions such as a quick reading a thread to get informed on a topic, to ask some targeted audience a question that interests you, to answer such a question, etc. Are blogs 2.0? Well, I think that they and social networks constitute the very heart of Web 2.0 environment. How about forums? I think that even if they are not the leading stars of the general movement, forums are still there, useful and present.

I think that there are some forum webmasters that would scream out loud when hearing that forums are considered not too active and popular nowadays. I think they know better, actually if you look at a forum with 15000 users or 30000 users or so, how could you possible say that it is not popular?

I would say that under any circumstances we can not say that forums are not popular nowadays. And maybe Web 2.0 also. How about it?

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One of the best ways to keep your site up and running is to post on it as often as possible. I know that due to time constraints there is not always possible to post each and every day since everyone of us has things to do. You have a Christian site and there is nothing better than to make it alive by posting on it, but how often should you post?

Think of quality,not of quantity

Well, from my experience, practical experience, I mean, there is no need to post each and every day IF YOU DON’T FEEL LIKE posting each and every day. The key here is quality, not quantity. Start a blog, ok, but post only when you have something to say, something that might interest your users since a website is built for your users, not for search engines.

Don’t get stressed about posting in order to keep the pace

People, first of all, want to read good info on the topics they are interested in. So don’t post just to keep the pace, no. Instead, plan your posts carefully and when you have something to say, say it in a way that people really understand what you wanted to transmit. After all, your Christian website is a media element, a way to promote ideas and there is nothing worse than make your readers bored. I post here every 2-3 days, when the time allows me and when I have something to say. Think about it! What is your way of posting on your blog?

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What really makes a website live? People. That is the only answer. As in other domains of activity, a Christian website, in particular, since this is our topic here, is driven by people. If you have people reading your website, your posts, looking at what you have done lately, then everything is good. You have an audience. People come to your website, comment on it, speak about it, etc. If you don’t have an active site, where people come and discuss, then you are dead. Your website is dead actually.

Forums used to be the heart of such living communities. There are many Christian forums outthere, there are many Christian communities on the internet, where people meet and speak. Nowadays, forums are not that popular anymore since blogs became the thing to have.

Of course, as the trend required, many Christian blogs appeared so people had something to look at and to read. Enter my site, see my blog, comment on it. This is the way you should think. Make people comment on your website so you have some movement there. A website that has no movement on it, does not have a life of it’s own. You need it, your site needs it.

Think as a business man, actually. Do you know what can define a good manager? In my opinion, a  good manager is that one that can build a business that run without his presence. Here is the same case. You start a Christian website, make all the efforts to make it run by itself without you being present to write on it. Think smart, make your site build a life of it’s own, this way you will work less but with more results. This is how you should think. This is how you should act.

I always try to train myself to think like this. Do you?

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I was recently asked if I provide here catholic blog templates. Of course I provide catholic blog templates, I provide also orthodox blog templates, Lutheran blog templates, etc. All you need to do is look around and you will find something to fit your needs. If you don’t find exactly but you find a blog template that can be turned into a catholic one, keep in mind that it can be done easily, with no big effort.

Catholic blog templates or not, they can be easily adapted. What I want to say is that it is an art form, you can not do it mathematically, you should find what you think it suits you best and the CUSTOMIZE it. This is what I have tried to tell you since a long time: using a church blog template the way it is, is ok, but customizing it is what you should do since you need a custom solution, your church blog or your church website is something particular, not a generic software, or at least it should not be.

What we provide here is something that you should build your church website or church blog around. If you download a free catholic blog template for ex, or you purchase a premium one, don’t consider that you have the final design for your website. Please don’t! Consider customizing it since your website should be unique, not a duplicated one.

Consider this and again, since I have started this with catholic blog templates, if you don’t find a catholic blog template that you like, use one that is close to what you are looking for and…customize it.

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I didn’t know about Christian Blog and Web Awards (http://christianblogawards.wordpress.com), but I have run across it today. It seems that on 24th September, Christian Blog and Web Awards were held in London.

FRIDAY NIGHT SAW the first Christian Blog and Web Awards, held at St Stephen Walbrook, London. Christians from all corners of the industry gathered to celebrate the achievements of those who work behind the scenes on leading Christian websites.

Hosted by internationally renowned author and speaker, Jeff Lucas and Premier radio presenter, Maria Toth, the awards were attended by one hundred distinguished guests, including the Bishop of London, the Rt Rev Richard Chartres who opened the award with a blessing.

What I was interested in, were the sites that were awarded. I found operation-greatbritain.com, unfurlingflower.blogspot.com, as well as other websites.

I invite you all to read the list and the whole article since you will find a collection of lovely Christian websites there.

Enjoy!

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While reading something about color theory on the internet I found this post about Christianity and colors. I must say that I found it to be a beautiful article about the color of religion, how they call it. The idea is quite simple and clear: an overview of colors from a religious point of view. I like the way the article is written, it gives me a pleasant feeling, a warmness inside…

The blog also covers Colors Of Buddhism and they also feature a great deal of articles about colors, but that is not the point of this post of mine. I just wanted to share a feeling with you, to point you to some article that I liked on the internet on some Christian blog.

I payed some thinking to this theory of colors from a religious point of view, I must admit I have never thought about it like this. Indeed, we should pay more attention to what it is around us, we should pay more attention to the colors of religion, also to the colors of love, colors of friendship.

Everything has it’s own colors, so everything could be presented in a colored manner. You just have to look around you. Do you know that there are people associating colors to letters and numbers? I am one of those people, really. IMo, 7 is blue. I have no idea why, I just know that 7 is blue. 1 is black I think.

I don’t know if you have such associations between colors and letters or numbers but you should think about it.

By the way…what colors your life has?

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As an observation, I was expecting more downloads for the Christian WordPress themes, but it is not link that. It may be that there are not that many bloggers outthere running Christian blogs on WordPress? I doubt that.

Come on, dear Christian bloggers, now you have the place where to download Christian templates for your blogs from. Take it, don’t wait! I will upload as many as possible here so you will have where to choose from.

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When you have decided to start a website, maybe you have asked yourself what should you actually base your site? On a blog or on a custom website, built by some designers? Well, what I can say is that it all depends on you. What exactly do you need? If you want a fast and easy to update platform, go with a blog, the engine is already built and it gives you the possibility to make any changes very fast and easy. I know a custom website will give you more freedom on how to structure the information but it will probably be more difficult to maintain.

However, my site here is a custom website, not a blog. But I do have a blog here, you are reading it right now. But the blog on my Christian web design site is just an auxiliary module of it, the site is the main part and it is built page by page by me and my collaborators. I prefer it this way.

You may read also other posts about blogs versus custom websites, see this one here for example  or this one.

So I just  say: if you want that the main part of your website be the content part, if you write often new information on your website, start it using a blog, download a Christian template from MT and that’s all, people, you have your site. If you want more, well, consider a bit of effort and have it built on a custom platform.

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When I launched this website I didn’t think of a community, but now I think more and more about it. A Christian community of website designers. I would like that people come here and meet, speak, etc. This requires a forum. A forum would be the best idea. Well, just that I had a forum and all I could say about it is that it got fast filled with spam comments. And I don’t have the time to clean it everyday.

However, I am not sure that this is the idea that I like about a community, I think I would like first to have people joining my site and upload Christian templates, like an open design community based on religious themes. This is what I would like to have here. Of course that people need to interact in order to call it a community. A Christian community, that is.So I would need a way to make people discuss…and I come back to that forum that I don’t quite like.

I thought about this blog as starting a community but I realize that I am using it more and more to transmit ideas, to tell you what I do and how the site’s been. And that’s about all! No community, right? Well and I come back to my forum again. A Christian web design forum.

A Christian forum would be a time eater

However, a forum is not easy to start and grow. One thing that you really need it is time to make it work. And that is what I miss here: time! I never have enough time for it. What I like about a website is that is a bit less of a time eater and more of a resource that needs boosting when you have a bit of time and you struggle to push it forward and let it go further. This is the way I am doing it now. I know that the best thing to do for a website is to always work on it, day and night and to maintain it every single moment, so the site feels “alive”! That is one of the best things to do for a website, just that this requires that the site bring you enough revenue so you can live out of it. And this site doesn’t bring me that much.

However, I like to grow it for the future. Considerings the (small) boost I’ve felt these last days, I think it is a good way to go.  Just that I come back thinking about that forum and about a community and about Christian designers interacting here on the site.

What do you think, would it be good to have a forum?

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