LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - The Parish Community Network is a 100 percent free website provided to each interested parish by Catholic Online. Catholic Online provides the hosting, the website, and everything free of charge - the parish pays nothing, ever.

In addition to serving as a free website, the PCN is much more than that. The PCN engages the parishioners and community by providing areas where the various organizations within the parish can have their own webpages.

For example, if a parish has an altar society, Knights of Columbus, and choir, each group will get its own webpage within the PCN. That page can be used to post important information, contacts, and updates which makes it easy for parishioners to learn what's going on in their community. There is no limit to the number of groups that be accommodated within the PCN, so the larger and more active a parish is, the more useful the PCN will be.

Catholic Online will even provide easy-to-update pages where a priest can post his homily and other important parish news. Updating of the PCN is easy to do using theHUB, a content management system also developed by Catholic Online.

The PCN also acts as a source of revenue for the parish. Local advertisers can run ads on the PCN and the parish will receive a larger portion of the revenue than they can get via traditional printing. The process saves trees, and if a parishioner still wants their parish update on paper, they have only to hit the print button on their computer.

Businesses get more too. Instead of a miniscule ad on the cluttered backside of a parish bulletin, each advertiser will get their own webpage which they can use to provide products info and images, special offers, directions to their location (Google map), and even a link to their website.

Above all, the PCN can be accessed anywhere. Whether parishioners have a smartphone handy or are seated in front of their computer, they don't have to keep track of a print bulletin to get updates on what's happening in their parish. If they miss a Sunday, they can catch up by visiting their PCN. And since the PCN is digital, there will be no bulletins lying on the floor after mass for cleanup.

Getting started with the PCN is as easy as a request to Faith Digital Media (FDM), a Catholic Online Technology Partner. FDM will handle distribution of the webpages which are expected to be popular.

© 2012, Distributed by NEWS CONSORTIUM.