An Alexandria company is helping local Catholic churches boost weeklydonations through automatic bank account and credit card deductions.

The process is the same as any automated bill payment: The company,Faith Direct, works with parishioners' banks so that a predeterminedamount is automatically deducted from their accounts or credit cards eachmonth. Contributions are itemized on parishioners' monthly statements.

For parishioners, direct-deposit contributions mean no more scramblingfor the checkbook on the way out the door to Mass.

For priests, they provide a predictable stream of income."This makes giving more of a planned event. What happens with somepeople, they don't really think that much about it -- they might put moneyin the basket, they might not," said Monsignor John Enzler, Archdiocese ofWashington vicar general for planning and development.

Since Thanksgiving, when Father Enzler implemented Faith Direct at theShrine of the Most Blessed Sacrament in Northwest, 107 of the parish's3,000 households have enrolled, resulting in more than $3,000 inelectronic fund transfers each week.

Seven or eight more parishes plan to join the program in the spring,and by 2008 or 2009, Father Enzler predicts at least half of the diocese's141 parishes will be relying on direct deposit for their weekly offerings.

But while electronic giving may just now be catching on locally, theidea is nothing new.

Phill Martin, director of education at the National Association ofChurch Business Administration, said he used electronic fund transfers asa church administrator at a Texas Baptist church nearly 10 years ago.

"We're seeing more and more vendors out there who are now providingthat service," Mr. Martin said. "Basically it's just churches followingthe trend of how we all do money."The Bible encourages Christians to donate 10 percent of their annualincome as a tithe.

"There are 350,000 churches in the country, many of them are verysmall and they don't have a lot of expertise there," said Matt Whitaker,president of Smart Payment Solutions Inc. in Arlington. "They could allbenefit."

In May 2003, Mr. Whitaker's company started marketing a program thatprovides churches with a Web site allowing parishioners to select theamount and frequency of deposits. Churches pay 35 cents per transaction inaddition to a monthly fee.

Though Mr. Whitaker initially marketed to Catholic parishes, thecompany has attracted Presbyterian and Baptist customers, he said.Faith Direct administers its program on behalf of the church,including direct-mail marketing to parishioners' homes. Churches arecharged a yearly fee -- varying from $6 to $9 according to the size of theparish -- for each household that signs up. The company guarantees anincrease in contributions by the end of one year or it refunds the money."The bottom line is the sooner that people engage in this type ofgiving, the better off [everyone will] be," said Faith Direct PresidentBrian Walsh, who started the company in 2003 and is Catholic. "Someexperts say it might be seven to 10 years before checkbooks may beextinct."

According to Susan Gibbs, spokeswoman for the Archdiocese ofWashington, weekly contributions have been rising at area parishes.The archdiocese just completed a $185 million capital campaign, thehighest-grossing Catholic capital campaign per capita, she said.Parishes are employing Faith Direct for convenience andpredictability, Father Enzler said. "Every family goes away a couple of weeks of the year, we have snow,things can happen where all of a sudden, people miss service. In mostcases, you do not recover [the contributions from] those Sundays," hesaid.

Households enrolled in Faith Direct increase their giving by anaverage of 27 percent, said Mr. Walsh, who created the direct-mailmarketing campaign for the Pope John Paul II Cultural Center in theDistrict.

Contributors can make additional gifts on church holidays or tosupport community programs.Mr. Walsh said he expects Faith Direct, which is used in sevendioceses across the country, to be used in 100 churches nationwide by theend of 2006. While the company's clients are all Catholic, Mr. Walsh saidhe would be receptive to doing business with other churches.

However, direct-deposit programs have sparked some controversy withinthe theological community."There is among the church some who feel that doing this is negativebecause it doesn't allow the person to participate in giving as a part ofworship," Mr. Martin said.In response, many vendors provide electronic givers with personalizedcards to place in offering plates.The bottom line, Father Enzler said, is that the church stays ahead ofthe curve.

"There's a sea change taking place in the way people do business. Astime goes on, we better be ready for it or we're going to find ourselvesbehind the eight ball."