Homestead Park United Methodist Church is a safe sanctuary church.

What is a Safe Sanctuary? The Western Pennsylvania United Methodist Conference mandated in 2000 that every church adopt a proactive approach towards child abuse prevention. After adopting the program, they dubbed their churches “Safe Sanctuaries”. The Conference outlined several key aspects the policy needed to include and every United Methodist Church has put into force or at the minimum at least attempted to draft a proactive policy.

What has HPUMC adopted?

In October 2004, our Church Council voted to adopt a sweeping overhaul of the policy we had presently in force at the time, which were at best minimums. The new policy called “We Heart Our Youth” requires that any adult who works with children under 18 years of age is required to participate in a 6 hour course. At the end of the course every adult will be certified to work with children and youth. The comprehensive course covers policy review, child abuse overview, and CPR certification from area emergency medical services providers. Additionally the policy sets guidelines for some of the following potential traps that churches find themselves in: mentoring, appropriate touching, clear boundaries for adults and students in personal relationships, and Christian reflected discipline of disruptive children or youth. Although this is a small list of the items we cover in our 9 page policy, a complete policy can be obtained in our church office for review.

Additionally, HPUMC has adopted a zero tolerance for child abuse and a zero tolerance for anything that might endanger a child’s welfare. Each of our adult leaders (defined as any adult 22 years of age or older who works with children or youth) is instructed on the proper handling suspect child abuse. We follow a very distinct chain of command for reporting child abuse at HPUMC, so there are no gaps in the reporting process.

Churches can fall victim to potential predators at any time and we are more than often the center of these attacks because we “trust” individuals. We, at HPUMC, believe that yes we can trust you, but we as a church cannot waver from the fact that we need to turn over every stone to weed out any attempts by these potential predators to harm our children. Every adult who works in our children and youth ministries must have current clearances on file, every adult must agree in writing to the “We Heart Our Youth” prevention policy, every adult must attend a refresher course once a year, and every adult is subject to a criminal history record review.

Our policy is aggressive and swift for the cause because we are constantly reminded of the evil around us when we open our newspapers and watch our televisions. HPUMC will do everything we can to protect our children and protect our adults. Jesus commanded us to "Let the children come to me, and do not hinder them; for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven." (Matthew 19:14)