Start with your people
Profiles, families, forms, events, registrations, tasks, and follow-up live in free Sanctuary Core.
Church management software
Church management software without the disconnected pieces
Sanctuary is one church management system for the people, serving, communication, events, service plans and giving your church already manages, so each ministry isn’t keeping its own separate list.
What’s included
Built around the work churches do every week
Connect every serving team
Schedules, availability, requests, replies, service orders, songs, and team communication share the same people.
Keep giving connected
Online gifts, recurring giving, funds, deposits, reports, and statements connect directly to church people and households.
Add only what you need
Core stays free. Add Serve, Give and Shepherd as you need them, using the same people records.
What a church management system should do
A church management system (ChMS) is the record of who belongs to your church and how they are involved: their household, the forms they filled in, the events they registered for, the teams they serve on and the gifts they gave. The point of one system is that each of those facts is entered once and is right everywhere.
Most churches end up with that record spread across a spreadsheet, a scheduling tool, a giving platform and a group text. Sanctuary keeps one people record underneath every app, so the family that registers for a retreat in Core is the same family a volunteer checks in on Sunday and the same household that receives a year-end giving statement.
Who Sanctuary is built for
Small and mid-sized churches that want one login and one record instead of four subscriptions. Single-campus churches can start free with Core; multi-campus churches can run up to five campuses on a self-serve plan, with every campus sharing the same directory.
Moving from the system you have now
Move to Sanctuary brings your people, households, funds and giving history across from your current system. You check everything before it is brought in, and you can undo the import until you say it is final. There is a step-by-step guide for moving from Planning Center.
Frequently asked questions
What is church management software?
Church management software (ChMS) keeps your church’s people records — members, visitors, families and children — together with the work that uses them: forms, events, volunteer schedules, giving and communication. Sanctuary does this with one shared people record across every app.
Is there a free church management system?
Yes. Sanctuary Core is free forever with unlimited people and households, forms and event registration, a calendar, tasks, custom fields and lists, and 1,000 mailing emails a month. No credit card is needed.
Is a church management system different from church management software?
No — the terms mean the same thing, often shortened to ChMS. What matters is whether the tools share one record of your people or keep separate copies that drift apart.
Can we move from Planning Center or another ChMS?
Yes. Move to Sanctuary imports people, households, funds and giving history. You review it before it is brought in and can undo the import until you mark it final.
Does Sanctuary work for multi-campus churches?
Yes. Every campus shares one directory, and staff can switch between campuses they belong to. Self-serve plans cover up to five campuses; larger churches can talk to us about more.
Who can see our people records?
Being a member of the church is not enough to open the directory. Administrators grant viewer, editor or admin access to Core, and Shepherd, the AI assistant, can only see what the person asking is allowed to see.