But, unfortunately, we’re a little bit atypical for a PCUSA church, in that most of our congregation is young and online. So you’re probably right about the demand, at least in the Presbyterian demographic. But (and I’m just guessing here) when you aggregate the sheer number of churches in the US, I think there would be enough demand to sustain development on something like this.

Actually, I think it has potential way beyond churches…think other organizations like schools — my wife was a public school elementary teacher for several years, and the teachers did the whole “meal thing” for each other, too. Same with tight-knit industries like local fire & police departments, and also military bases. All of these function like “family” communities living in close proximity to one another.

Anyhow, just some thoughts and encouragement for what seems like a great idea/product…

No, there’s no intention of creating community around the site, but simply allowing communities that exist to better organize. The ultimate plan is to:

1) Have the meal list function based upon name and location the same way that, say, Target’s gift registry works. If you have a friend getting married you go to the Target website, type in name and location, and up pops the registry. The idea for Ekklesion is that you’d click “Give a Meal” and then type in the name, a list of potentials would come up and you’d go to that person’s page;

2) I also want to create a branded version for churches and other local communities that they could either a) host on their own website and customize; or b) open an account and host and host their branded church site through Ekklesion.

I have some other ideas, too, but am trying to judge how much demand there is for something like this. My guess is, “not much.” But I could be wrong.

If it’s the former, it would seem that some filtering for geographic location or church community would be helpful, and perhaps not too hard to implement? If it’s the latter, (and PHP is perfect for this), have you considered making a downloadable trial version so churches can make sure it integrates well with their own sites?

I definitely think this is a great tool, and something I’m pretty sure our church would be interested in.

Looks like we have some geek interest in common, too - did you code the program (before rent-a-coder, which I’ve also used!) in PHP, Python, or Perl?