FaithFinder MCP Server: Find a Church from Any AI Assistant

FaithFinder is a free church finder for the United States. This Model Context Protocol (MCP) server lets ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Copilot, Cursor and other AI assistants answer questions like these with real, current church listings:

• "Find me a church near Frisco, TX with a good kids ministry"
• "We're moving to Nashville. Are there any Reformed or Presbyterian churches?"
• "Is there an Anglican church near 30309?"
• "What is Watermark Community Church in Dallas like? Where can I watch their sermons?"
• "I'm not sure what kind of church fits me. Can you help?"

It searches 9,000+ Christian churches across all 50 states + DC by city, ZIP code, denomination, worship style, kids/youth ministry, size, and theology. Each result includes the church's website, latest sermon video, statement of faith, Google rating, and a link to its FaithFinder profile.

No API key, no account, and no network calls: the data ships with the package and is searched in memory.

---

Quick start

Claude Desktop

Add to claude_desktop_config.json (macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/, Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "faithfinder": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "faithfinder-mcp-server@latest"]
    }
  }
}

Claude Code

claude mcp add faithfinder -- npx -y faithfinder-mcp-server@latest

VS Code / GitHub Copilot

Click Install in VS Code above, or add to .vscode/mcp.json:

{ "servers": { "faithfinder": { "command": "npx", "args": ["-y", "faithfinder-mcp-server@latest"] } } }

Cursor

Click Install in Cursor above, or add the Claude Desktop JSON to ~/.cursor/mcp.json.

Windsurf

Add the Claude Desktop JSON to ~/.codeium/windsurf/mcp_config.json.

Gemini CLI

gemini mcp add faithfinder npx -y faithfinder-mcp-server@latest

ChatGPT, Claude.ai and other web or mobile apps (remote connector)

Web and mobile chat apps connect to a hosted HTTPS endpoint, not to npx. Deploy the server (see Hosting a remote endpoint), then add:

• ChatGPT: Settings → Apps & Connectors → Developer mode → Create → URL https://<your-host>/mcp, no auth.
• Claude.ai: Settings → Connectors → Add custom connector → https://<your-host>/mcp.
• Custom GPT Actions: import https://<your-host>/openapi.json (or openai-action.json).

---

Tools

Tool	When an assistant uses it
find_churches	"Find a church near…" requests. Accepts natural language ("contemporary church with kids ministry in Plano TX") plus optional city, state, zipCode, denomination, worshipStyle, hasKidsMinistry, churchSize, theology, limit. Falls back to nearby ZIPs and says so when filters are relaxed.
get_church_details	Questions about one church: beliefs, sermons, website, reviews, similar churches nearby.
church_match_quiz	The person isn't sure what kind of church fits them. Returns 4 short questions, 4 church archetypes, and the free Soul Signature quiz link.
list_church_coverage	Which states and cities are covered, with counts.
search / fetch	ChatGPT connector / deep-research compatible search and fetch (OpenAI MCP spec).

All tools are read-only (readOnlyHint: true) and have no side effects.

Resources: faithfinder://overview, faithfinder://coverage, faithfinder://theology-and-styles Prompts: find_a_church, church_search_advisor

---

Hosting a remote endpoint

HTTP mode turns on automatically when PORT is set (or with --http). It runs a stateless Streamable HTTP MCP endpoint plus a small REST API:

Path	Purpose
POST /mcp	MCP endpoint (ChatGPT, Claude.ai, any remote MCP client)
GET /api/churches/search?q=…	REST search (used by Custom GPT Actions)
GET /api/churches/{id or name}	REST church details
GET /api/quiz/archetypes	REST quiz framework
GET /openapi.json	OpenAPI 3.1 spec (server URL filled from PUBLIC_BASE_URL)
GET /.well-known/mcp.json	MCP discovery card
GET /health	Health check

# Local
PORT=8080 PUBLIC_BASE_URL=http://localhost:8080 npm start

# Google Cloud Run (from this folder; scales to zero)
gcloud run deploy faithfinder-mcp --source . --region us-central1 --allow-unauthenticated \
  --set-env-vars PUBLIC_BASE_URL=https://<service-url>

After deploying, add a remotes entry to server.json ({"type": "streamable-http", "url": "https://<host>/mcp"}) and republish to the MCP Registry.

---

Crawlable web pages for AI search engines (npm run build:web)

AI answer engines (ChatGPT Search, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, Copilot) don't run JavaScript, so they can only cite pages that exist as real HTML. This command generates them from the same data:

npm run build:web          # -> ./web-kit

Output	What it is
us/, us/{state}/, us/{state}/{city}/	National, state and city directories (ItemList + FAQPage JSON-LD)
church/{state}/{city}/{slug}/	One page per church (schema.org Church JSON-LD)
llms.txt, llms-full.txt	llms.txt summary and full index for LLMs
robots.txt, sitemap.xml	Welcomes GPTBot, OAI-SearchBot, ClaudeBot, PerplexityBot, Google-Extended and others; lists every page

The FaithFinder web app copies web-kit/ into dist/ during its build (scripts/copy_web_kit.js). The MCP server's profile links point at these pages.

---

Links

• Website: https://faithfinder.armornglory.com
• Church directory: https://faithfinder.armornglory.com/us/
• Soul Signature quiz: https://faithfinder.armornglory.com/quiz
• npm: https://www.npmjs.com/package/faithfinder-mcp-server
• MCP Registry name: io.github.ArmorNGlory/faithfinder-mcp-server

Privacy & security

• Queries are processed in memory; nothing is logged off-machine and no telemetry is sent.
• All outbound links are HTTPS-upgraded and screened against risky TLDs and blocked domains.
• Listings are for discovery. Service times and details can change, so please confirm with the church.

Changelog

2.0.0

• Breaking change: tools renamed for discoverability. search_faith_finder_churches → find_churches, get_faith_finder_church_details → get_church_details, get_soul_signature_quiz → church_match_quiz. Added list_church_coverage, search and fetch.
• All links now go to faithfinder.armornglory.com. The old faithfinder.app links pointed to an unrelated site.
• Natural-language search (city/state/ZIP extraction, nearby-ZIP fallback). Fixed state matching: "CA" no longer matches North Carolina, and "TX" now matches rows stored as "Texas".
• Fixed HTTP mode, which failed after the first request. Now a stateless Streamable HTTP endpoint plus a REST API.
• Added MCP Registry server.json, tool annotations, server instructions, and the build:web crawlable-pages generator.

License

MIT © ArmorNGlory