Transcript:
Greetings, beloved in Christ. I hope that you are well on this day, and I hope that your summer is off to a good start. This summer in the Episcopal Church in Colorado, we are doing our Safe Church audit. That is when we go through all of our records to find which leaders need to recertify themselves with Safe Church. This summer, I was one such leader, and I wanted to take this opportunity to talk about the importance of Safe Church.
In our baptismal covenant, we vow that we will seek and serve Christ in all persons, that we will strive for justice and peace, and that we will respect the dignity of every human being. Our Safe Church training in the Episcopal Church shows us meaningful and practical ways on how we as church can not only fulfill those promises but make church a safe place for everyone.
Church may not always be comfortable. In fact, I think sometimes the Holy Spirit calls us out of our comfort zones into a space of faithfulness, but church should always be safe. It should be a place where no one is under threat of violence, whether it's physical, emotional, or spiritual. It should be a place where everyone has a sense of themselves as worthy and valuable. It is important in church that we maintain healthy boundaries, that we find ways to deal faithfully with conflict and disagreement, and that we hold at our heart the vows that we make at our baptism.
Your bishop has fully completed her Safe Church recertification, and we will be reaching out to church leaders all over the Diocese so that they may fulfill theirs. I pray always that our church reflects the love of Christ that we have known and that we are indeed a safe church. Blessings.