Today is Ash Wednesday. The priest traced a cross of ash on my forehead and whispered the ancient words: “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” It’s a strange, sobering, and somehow freeing thing to hear. It strips everything down.
And in that stripping-down, I found a question: what do I do with what I have been given?
I build things. I think in systems. I see the gap between where technology is and where the Church still lives — and I know, with a clarity I rarely feel, that this gap is one I can help close.
The Challenge
For the 40 days of Lent — six weeks, one app per week — I am committing to building tools that serve the Church. Not polished SaaS products. Not funded startups. Just useful, honest, working software for the people who gather in churches, lead choirs, volunteer in parishes, and try to build community in a world that has largely moved on to feeds and notifications.
Each week I’ll pick a real problem. I’ll build something to solve it. I’ll write about what I learned — the code, the community need, the theology behind the design decision.
We are living through an extraordinary moment in AI. The tools available to a single builder today would have required an engineering team five years ago. That is a gift. I want to use it.
Why This, Why Now
The Church has always been an early adopter of communication technology — the printing press, the organ, the microphone, the radio broadcast of Mass during the pandemic. Community gathers around shared experience, and shared experience needs infrastructure.
Right now, AI can generate, summarize, translate, and synthesize faster than any human. That means a single builder can create things that genuinely serve hundreds of people — without a team, without a budget, and often in a single evening. I find that remarkable, and a little humbling. It is the kind of leverage that comes with responsibility.
So I’m using Lent as a discipline. One week, one app, each an act of craft in service of community. I’ll write about every one of them — what I built, what I learned, what broke, and what surprised me. I hope some of you build alongside me, or use what I make, or just find it interesting to watch.
The Commitment
One app. One week. One community need addressed. Free to use, built with care.
This is what I know. This is what I can build. For 40 days, it’s my small offering.
Follow along on this blog every week through Easter Sunday, April 5th, 2026. All feedback is welcome. And if your parish has a problem that software could solve — reach out.
Part of the Building series · Lent 2026 · Ash Wednesday to Easter