Managing People and Households

Shepherd is built around two linked ideas: the person (an individual you pastor) and the household (the family unit they belong to). Most pastoral work happens at one of those two levels, so Shepherd lets you switch between them freely.

The Person/Household toggle

Open the People tab. At the top you’ll find a segmented control:

• People — a flat list of every individual in your congregation.
• Households — the same people, grouped into family cards.

The toggle is not a filter. It’s a change of lens. The underlying data is the same; you’re choosing whether to think family-first or individual-first for the task at hand.

A “Needs Care” filter in the toolbar narrows either view to only the people (or households containing people) that the Dashboard is currently flagging for attention.

Creating a person

Tap + from the People list. The create sheet has collapsible sections:

• Identity — first name, last name, preferred name, pronouns, photo.
• Contact — phone, email, address (address auto-inherits from household if one is set).
• Pastoral — Church Role (member, regular, visitor, minor, staff, layLeader, volunteer, other) and Pastoral Status (active, new, homebound, inCrisis, disengaging, inactive, visitor, bereaved, transferred).
• Sacramental dates — baptism, confirmation, first communion, wedding anniversary. Leave blank if not applicable.
• Household — pick an existing one or tap Create new household to spin one up inline.
• Notes — pastoral notes (see the confidentiality note below).

Only a name is required. You can always fill in more later.

The Person detail view

Tapping a person opens their full pastoral file:

• Header card — name, photo, pastoral-status badge, church-role badge, and a link to their household.
• Contact card — tap a phone number to call, an email to compose, an address to open Maps.
• Attendance timeline — every event they’ve been checked in to.
• Contact log — lightweight outreach (a phone call, a text, a hallway conversation). Use Log Contact for these.
• Pastoral visits — substantive encounters. Use Log Visit for these. See the Logging Pastoral Visits and Contacts article.
• Life events — births, baptisms, weddings, deaths, job changes. See the Tracking Life Events and Anniversaries article.
• Prayer requests — any requests currently open for this person.
• Groups — every group this person belongs to, with their role in each.
• Sacramental dates — a compact readout of baptism, confirmation, first communion, wedding anniversary.
• Pastoral notes — long-form notes behind a tap, with a confidentiality banner.

From the header you can also tap Pray for this person, which creates a prayer request already linked to them.

Creating and editing households

In the Households view, tap + to create a new household. A household has:

• A display name — auto-derived (“The Smith Family”, “Smith & Jones”), or set your own.
• Address, home phone, and household notes.
• Members — added by picking existing people or creating new ones.

The Household detail view shows the whole family on one card with role badges, pastoral-status dots, contact info, and anniversaries. From here you can:

• Log household visit — opens the visit sheet pre-linked to the head of household.
• Add member — pick from the roster or create a new person already linked to this household.
• Pray for household — create a prayer request linked to the whole family.

Household roles

Each member has a Household Role: head, spouse, adult, child, dependent. These inform the default family-card layout and the household’s computed display name. A household can have multiple adults without a “head” if that fits your family better.

The family-card PDF

From any household, tap the share icon to generate a one-page PDF family card — names, contact info, photos, anniversaries. Hand it to a visiting pastor, elder, or care-team volunteer.

Roles and statuses, briefly

• Church Role describes who the person is in your congregation: member, regular, visitor, minor, staff, lay leader, volunteer, other. This is about belonging.
• Pastoral Status describes the shape of your current pastoral relationship: active, new, homebound, in crisis, disengaging, inactive, visitor, bereaved, transferred. This is about care.

A person can be a member whose pastoral status is homebound — they fully belong and they need a specific kind of care. The two fields work together; don’t collapse them into one.

A word on confidentiality

Pastoral notes and any visit flagged as confidential are hidden behind a tap with a visible banner. Counseling and bereavement visits default to confidential. These notes still sync through your personal iCloud, so the device-level protections that apply to the rest of your phone apply here too.

Shepherd is built around two linked ideas: the person (an individual you pastor) and the household (the family unit they belong to). Most pastoral work happens at one of those two levels, so Shepherd lets youswitch between them freely.