Blocks For Sermon Manager

Description

Blocks for Sermon Manager allows you to display sermons from the WordPress
Plugin Sermon Manager or Mattytap Sermons within the block builder of
your website without resorting to using the normal shortcodes.

This plugin provides three kinds of Blocks:

• Blocks that bring the existing shortcodes to the Block editor, with
  attributes you can edit in the block editor to see the effect, and
  which then call through to the existing shortcode in the background.
  With these you can replace the existing shortcodes with blocks and see
  the same output as before. We provide blocks for the following
  Sermon Manager shortcodes:

  • sermons … to display a list or grid of sermons, with many
    filters to focus in on a specific set of sermons if needed. This is
    in the block called “Display Sermons”
  • sermon_images … to display the images of each series, (not
    sermons, despite the name) optionally with the series title and/or
    description extract. This is in the block called “Sermon Images”
    despite the obvious misnomer of the original short-code.
  • sermon-_sort_fields … to display the filter bar that allows
    the user to ‘drill down’ the list of sermons displayed. This is
    in the block called “Display Filters” because that makes more sense!
  • List-Sermons … to display a simple text list of series,
    preachers, service types, bible books or topics from the sermon
    taxonomies. This is in the block called “List Sermons”, again
    despite the obvious misnomer of the original shortcode.

• Blocks that provide sermon grids and lists without dependence on the
  existing shortcodes. These have less configuration and give a predefined
  output that should be suitable for most uses. Currently we provide:

  • Sermon grid … where each sermon is displayed in a ‘card’
    with the sermon image and details and a link to the fuller single
    sermon page.
  • Single sermon … to display one sermon with the sermon image,
    all its details and a media player.

  These blocks can also be put into Block Theme templates for Sermon
  Manager Sermons / Series / Book / Author / Service Type template pages

• Field blocks that allow each field of Sermon Manager data to be included
  within a bespoke ‘Query Loop’ block so that you can create your own
  lists of sermons with bespoke look and feel from within the block
  editor without having to do any coding.

The plugin also provides some example Query Loop patterns that use these
fields to output Sermon Grids, Sermon Lists and Single Sermons.

Support

If you have a problem or a feature request, please send a message to the
author using the ‘Support’ tab.

Demo

These blocks are currently in use on the www.cambray.org church website.

On the Latest Sermons page: https://www.cambray.org/resources/latest-sermons/

The shortcode block **Display Sermons** is used for the Recent Sermons
at the top of the page, and the **Sermon Images** block is used for the
image grid of the past sermon series.

On the All Sermons page: https://www.cambray.org/sermons

The **Sermon Grid** block, preceded by the **Sermon Filter**
block are used to display the list of all sermons.<h3>Contributions</h3>

This plugin relies on the Sermon Manager or MattyTap Sermons plugin being
already installed and sermons already entered into the website. It is
purely to enable the display of sermons to be more ‘block friendly’ and
does not replace or change any of the functionality of these plugins.

Usage

Using the Block Replacements for Shortcodes

• Add one of the blocks in the place where you wish to use them, as you
  would have previously added a shortcode.
• Use the attributes to choose those attribute values you would have
  previously put into the shortcode.
  • The default attribute values provided in the attributes respect the
    default values in the shortcodes – you only need to set values you
    want to be changed.
  • The display of sermons in the block editor will change to reflect
    the attribute choices you make. The output should be very similar
    to what you will see on the front end, but always check the front
    end to be sure of how it appears.
  • As with the shortcodes, the appearance of the output of these
    blocks can be changed via css style sheets. If you want to only
    change the appearance for the output of the block and not the
    original shortcodes, then precede each css style with the class
    .b4sm. The same classes are used for styling as for the shortcodes.

Using the new non-shortcode Sermon Display Blocks

• Add one of the blocks in the place where you wish to use it.
• If you are adding the block within a Block Template, then the block
  will pick up the correct sermons in the front end, but in the back
  end it will say that it can’t find any sermons. This is because it is
  only a Template and does not have a sermon query for that page until
  the Template is rendered on the front end.
• Use the attributes to choose what to display of the available sermon
  meta data.
• The block output on the front-end can be styled using css style sheets.
  The blocks use the same css classes as Sermon Manager for the various
  elements of each Sermon. If you want to only change the appearance for
  the output of the block and not other Sermon Manager output, then
  precede each css style with the class.b4sm.

Using the Blocks for the Sermon Manager Fields to create custom output

The following allows you to re-create a sermon grid layout. This is just
an example – you can create whatever output look you want!

• Add an outer container (such as a Group or similar) to contain the output
  In the advanced block attributes, set the class to wpfc-sermons-container
  if you want the internals to pick up Sermon Manager styles.
• Within this outer container add a Query Loop Block.
• In the attributes pane of the Query Loop block, choose to do a Custom
  Query
• In the Custom Query, choose Sermons (or whatever of the taxonomies you
  want. You can also use the other taxonomies to ‘drill down’ to only
  display the particular sermons you want on that page.
• In the Query add a container block (such as a Group). If you want to pick
  up the predefined Sermon Manager styles, in the ‘Advanced’ attributes
  section add a class wpfc-sermon (if it is a sermon you are rendering.
• Optionally, if you want to separately style an outer and inner block,
  add a container block within the previous block and set it’s class
  to wpfc-sermon-inner.
• In the container block add a Sermon Image block (if wanted)
• If you are adding sermon details, add a container block and set it’s
  class to wpfc-sermon-main if you want to pick up Sermon Manager styles
• In this container add main sermon items like the title, the preacher,
  the description, the bible passage or the series. If you are going to
  not have the user click through to the sermon page to get the media,
  add a sermon media block. You do not need to set any classes – we
  automatically add the predefined Sermon Manager classes for styling.
• If you want other sermon meta data, why not add another container to
  group your less prominent meta data, and potentially use the container
  styling to give it a different background.
• You can then also add meta data fields, like date, topic, bible book
• You can use the prefix and suffix fields in each attribute to add in
  labels for the fields, if you wish. Click in the prefix or suffix text
  you add and use the floating menu to set to bold or italic or whatever.
• You can then style each container or field as you wish to get the
  results you want.

Providing these blocks gives you infinite flexibility in the layout of the
lists of sermons you want to produce – just lay it out yourself! The
suggestion above for containers is only a helpful suggestion!

We also provide a number of Block Patterns for commonly used sermon
layouts – just drag and drop one in, change what details you want, and
it gives you a great shortcut to produce bespoke sermon list layouts.

The Query Loop container will automatically add pagination as needed.

If you want to provide the sermon filter bar, just add the filter bar
block before or after the container holding the query loop.

License

The plugin is released under the GNU General Public License. A
copy of this license can be found at the license homepage or in the top
comment within the blocks4sm.php file.

Technical details