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Changelog

All notable changes to Petra docs.

2026-08-20 — review pass

Responds to the editorial review (review/FINDINGS.md, kept local) and ports the content of PR #4, which is closed in favour of this pass.

  • Who fixes the set: Song Selector publishes the proposed set by the weekly deadline; it is fixed when the Director confirms — or by the confirm-by time if the Director is silent; the Worship Lead publishes keys/forms/charts by a separate keys/charts deadline (default ≥ 48 h before ready-to-rehearse). Playbook, charters, Scope, policy, worksheet, runbook, handouts aligned
  • One set of role names: Definitions is current-state only (rename history lives here); new hatsPlatform lead (whom band and media watch; usually the Worship Lead; named on the service plan), Service Planner, Section lead; “the leader” / “platform lead” replaced throughout; Qualified defined (on the roster for the role, or signed off by the domain lead)
  • Director accountability reworded to “the congregation’s worship and the team’s health”; Director does not conduct from the floor; Worship Lead owns musical calls during the service and calls freeze / monitor freeze
  • Song selection: “ban” language → we avoid; leadership (Director with pastoral oversight) may make a documented exception to the two avoidances; worked allowed/avoid examples and a crude singability test; 50-title counter clarified (“sung in the trailing 12 months”, seasonal titles count, Rest does not free a slot); new-song gate checks the licensed catalog
  • Clocks / freeze: Present · Ready (= call time) · Service-ready · Freeze (default doors, called once on talkback) defined and printed on the run-of-show, service plan, and every tech checklist; monitor freeze distinguished; 90-minute midweek clock rebuilt (5 frame · 5 review · 5 warm-up · 45 work · 20 run · 10 notes) with a worked example; pre-service sample clock
  • One source for church values: [TBD] and duplicate blanks removed from policy pages; runbook clock pages say “copy from Our Congregation”; Our Congregation gains Petra defaults vs you-must-fill, a before-your-first-Sunday checklist (from PR #4), safety & care rows (designated reporter, AED/exits, hearing policy), confirm-by and keys/charts clocks, licensing buckets, local song gray-area rows, strobes, first-week logistics
  • Safety (light touch): adhere to your congregation’s protection policy; baseline stated; do not serve until you have the policy and the designated reporter; do not investigate / confront / promise secrecy; incident log carries no protection matters. Incidents: stopping-for-a-person rule, pastor-mic / IEM-death / feedback / power rows; no references to SOPs that don’t exist
  • Disclosure is not permission for the prior-rehearsal rule; swap cover takes rehearsal and service; swap confirmer named; exception-granted fields
  • Licensing buckets with a reporting owner; tracks-in-room ≠ masters-on-stream
  • Tech: plain-language minimum viable Sunday per seat and a one-tech boot order; new Stage Checklist; spoken word first in FOH priorities; hearing as people-safety; strobes off by default; glossary rebuilt around volunteer vocabulary
  • Foundation: index split Binding vs Teaching; study marked “not policy”; Jacob scenes, staff wording, Col 3:16, Num 8:19, Rom 14 / Col 2 corrected or added — pending pastoral review; Mission: craft removes obstacles, does not manufacture presence; Playbook trump sentence limited to artistic/preference conflicts; “Defaults over doctrine” → “Defaults over preference debates”
  • Templates: service plan (Platform lead, Song Selector, Media, special dress, theology-sensitive note, doors/freeze); rehearsal agenda; setlist worksheet (WL columns, exceptions line, spontaneous-inside-rehearsed-song); annual register; onboarding checklist; new Assessment Notes; swap request; incident log; input-list.csv StandMic_mount
  • Culture, care, onboarding: wardrobe rewritten around function with private correction; pastoral care “bigger than the band” table; vocalist “smile with your eyes” → be present, watch the Platform lead; green-room rule written out; written assessment outcome with two listeners; first-30-days reads Mission + Values
  • README Start here table and template notice; CONTRIBUTING leads with Editing content (no git needed) and a pre-filled issue link; Changelog and Contributing off the site sidebar; LICENSE placeholder filled; Owner line on the Playbook
  • Handouts: drifts fixed (who grants rehearsal exceptions; who to phone; the two avoidances named), terms aligned, type enlarged

2026-08-20

  • Website: MkDocs Material site published to GitHub Pages on every merge to main (.github/workflows/pages.yml, .mkdocs/mkdocs.yml, per-folder .pages titles); PRs build strictly and attach a preview artifact; handout PDFs rendered by 12-quick-reference/build-pdfs.sh to /pdf/; folder links point at README.md so they resolve on both GitHub and the site
  • Each quick-reference page now carries a Download the two-page PDF link (to the workflow-built /pdf/ file); the line is hidden in the PDF itself
  • 11-reference/open-questions.md10-templates/our-congregation.md: the open-questions list becomes a fill-in-the-blank template for each church's names, clocks, tools, and rules, with a pointer to the page where every value is used; questions Petra itself had already answered were dropped
  • Logo: assets/petra.jpg (the rock-cut city under the star) is the runbook mark — derived petra-logo.png, favicon.png, favicon.ico, apple-touch-icon.png; used as site logo + favicon, README header, and beside the title on the handout PDFs; site palette moved to deep purple to match
  • QR codes: every site page embeds a QR of its own URL (print-only on screen; qr.svg / qr.png served beside each page; "QR for this page" link in the footer) via .mkdocs/hooks/qr.py; handout PDFs carry a QR to their live page beside the title and ship /pdf/<name>.qr.png
  • Removed per-page Status / Last reviewed / Review cadence stamps and the README status legend — Petra is a living system; git history and this changelog are the record. Pages keep their Owner line. “Active policy” wording simplified to “policy” in decision rights and CONTRIBUTING
  • Roles renamed to match the line of authority Pastor → Director → team leads: the ministry owner (formerly “Worship Lead”) is now the Director — owns congregational musical worship under the pastor, appoints Worship Lead / Song Selector / Tech Lead, and carries responsibility and accountability for the worship experience (pastor has final say); the musical lead (formerly “MD” / “Music Director”) is now the Worship Lead. Charters swapped (01-roles/director.md, 01-roles/worship-lead.md), decision rights updated (Director appoints team leads, pastor consulted; pastor appoints the Director), definitions record the former names
  • New 12-quick-reference/ — two-page handouts that point back into the skeleton: musician (band & vocals), tech (all tech roles), Song Selector, and a pastor overview of the framework
  • README routing table, PLAYBOOK, and CONTRIBUTING updated to reference the new folder

2026-08-19

  • Foundation motion: the service is an opportunity to attend to Someone besides yourself — a distraction from the world is fine; a distraction from God is not, and attention is not aimed at the worship leaders
  • Added as mission-vision "Where attention goes", values #2 "Attention goes past the platform", a platform-etiquette presence line, and a PLAYBOOK intro line

2026-08-18

  • New PLAYBOOK.md — the playbook on one page: north star, five habits, every role in one line, the week at a glance
  • Terminology aligned with definitions: group time is rehearsal (practice is personal); pre-service clock renamed to ready for run-through / service-ready
  • Role index now carries one-line summaries; Service Planner noted as a hat, not a separate charter
  • Stage/Logistics charter gains the same prior-rehearsal attendance line as other tech roles
  • Wardrobe guidelines linked from platform etiquette and vocalist charter; annual repertoire register listed in templates index
  • Small wording cleanups across checklists and charters (no policy changes)
  • Established the general rehearsal flow: review the last performance, warm up, work every part of the set, explicitly rehearse every transition, and run the set in sequence
  • Updated the midweek runbook, rehearsal standards, and rehearsal-agenda template to make the flow actionable

2026-08-17

  • Defined six core song criteria: biblically defensible theology, corporate-worship intent, congregational ownership, congregational singability, clear Christian confession, and pastoral usefulness
  • Added the core criteria to the Song Selector lens, song lifecycle, annual new-song gate, and per-service setlist check

2026-08-14

  • New baseline sermon/team study: 00-foundation/freedom-in-form-study.md — Jacob, Levitical service, Ephesians 5, and freedom through ordered service and corporate orthodoxy
  • New draft song-selection policy: 50-title rolling annual ceiling; no secular/generic love songs or first-person-God songs; week-to-week carryover; doctrinal, congregational, and new-song gates
  • New annual repertoire register; updated Song Selector, song lifecycle, music-library index, and setlist worksheet

2026-08-13

  • Foundation intent: congregation sings; Petra = mundane framework that frees the artist
  • Definitions: framed worship / serve / perform / player / rehearsal language
  • Policy: prior group rehearsal required to serve the linked service (rehearsal standards + scheduling)
  • New: 05-tech/lyrics-and-stage-displays.mdconfidence monitors (aka video monitors) default over stands; house lyric standards
  • Terminology: video monitors = confidence monitors (preferred term)
  • Tech attends prior rehearsal (same bar as band); house + confidence slides used at practice
  • New role: Song Selector (set/song diet; handoff to Worship Lead)
  • Updated media checklist, media/band/vocalist roles, pre-service note, glossary, open questions, culture, contributing

2026-08-12

  • Initial runbook structure and draft policies/procedures
  • Role charters for band + tech
  • Templates for plans, input list, incidents, onboarding
  • Open questions list for church-specific fill-in
https://theonize.github.io/petra/CHANGELOG/
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