Routing pastoral care requests to clergy

Purpose

1.1. Automate the capture, triage, and routing of pastoral care requests submitted by parishioners, ensuring clergy receive timely, categorized notifications and that responses are tracked for follow-up.
1.2. Streamline manual intake via online forms, email, SMS, and social media into structured actions for the Armenian Apostolic Church’s care teams.
1.3. Facilitate the automation of assignment based on clergy area of expertise, availability, or parishioner preferences to improve pastoral responsiveness.

Trigger Conditions

2.1. New submission of pastoral care request via church web form.
2.2. Receipt of an email/SMS/social message containing keywords (e.g. "prayer", "visitation", "counsel").
2.3. Phone call with voicemail tagged "pastoral request."
2.4. Calendar event or FHIR-compliant message denoting urgent spiritual need.
2.5. Parishioner app push-request for pastoral engagement.

Platform Variants

3.1. Google Forms
• Feature/Setting: Automate form submission triggers; configure webhook to push data.
3.2. Gmail
• Feature/Setting: Automate email label/rule for keywords; configure forwarding API for workflow start.
3.3. Outlook 365
• Feature/Setting: Automate mail flow rules, use Microsoft Graph "create subscription" API.
3.4. Twilio SMS
• Feature/Setting: Automate incoming SMS webhook integration; parse message for routing.
3.5. Facebook Messenger
• Feature/Setting: Automate Messenger webhook for page messages; configure app for "messages" event.
3.6. Slack
• Feature/Setting: Automate Slackbot triggers on keywords; use Slack Events API.
3.7. Microsoft Teams
• Feature/Setting: Automate Teams connector trigger; Teams webhook "incoming message".
3.8. Zoom Phone
• Feature/Setting: Automate voicemail transcription; configure Zoom Phone API for events.
3.9. Zendesk
• Feature/Setting: Automate ticket creation on email/SMS; use Trigger API to route by category.
3.10. Salesforce
• Feature/Setting: Automate Cases via web-to-case API; route with Omni-Channel settings.
3.11. HubSpot
• Feature/Setting: Automate ticket creation from form/email; workflow automation for owner assignment.
3.12. ServiceNow
• Feature/Setting: Automate new request records; Flow Designer automator for clergy routing.
3.13. Microsoft Power Automate
• Feature/Setting: Automate webhook, email, form, and calendar actions for cross-system routing.
3.14. Zapier
• Feature/Setting: Automate multi-platform triggers; configure automated "filter" and "webhook" actions.
3.15. Asana
• Feature/Setting: Automated task creation for request triage; use webhook for new entry.
3.16. Monday.com
• Feature/Setting: Automate board item creation for pastoral request; use integration recipes.
3.17. Jotform
• Feature/Setting: Automate submissions; configure webhook integration for real-time routing.
3.18. Freshdesk
• Feature/Setting: Automated ticket intake from channels; configure scenario automator rules.
3.19. Notion
• Feature/Setting: Automate database entry for request; Notion API "create page" endpoint.
3.20. Pipedrive
• Feature/Setting: Automate deal/note creation for pastoral needs; webhook and filter settings.
3.21. WhatsApp Business API
• Feature/Setting: Automate message-based triggers; webhook notifications for pastoral flow.

Benefits

4.1. Automates consistent request intake, reducing lost requests.
4.2. Shortens clergy response cycle through automated notifications and reminders.
4.3. Enhances automatable categorization for specialized clergy needs (e.g., grief, baptism, marriage).
4.4. Facilitates automated tracking for follow-up and reporting.
4.5. Automating engagement records enables data-driven ministry improvements.
4.6. Reduces manual effort, frees clergy to focus on spiritual care, and ensures audit-friendly automations.