You’ve probably seen Realm® mentioned in the Sunday bulletin a few times recently.  So, what is it? Realm® is our new church database management system, which our staff uses to run the daily operations of our church.  Not only will this improve the work life for our ministry and administrative staff, but it also offers some exciting opportunities to enhance our communications and support the way you are involved in our church.

Realm® is a way for us to connect and stay connected as a church family. Going forward, it will be used to communicate with the whole congregation, as well as various groups in the church, sign up for classes, RSVP to events, manage your giving, update profile information, and more. Here are four benefits to using Realm® at All Saints’:

• News – Keep up-to-date with the latest posts, photos, and events for classes, groups and our church as a whole.  Realm® makes it easier for us to connect throughout the week and know what’s happening.
• Education – Each class you participate in will have a dedicated space in Realm® where teachers can communicate with the class, post class materials, post relevant links and articles, and start conversations with all class participants.  Class members can continue to engage in class discussions outside of the classroom.  Groups and classes are an important part of our church, and now you can connect with the people in them throughout the week.
• Community – Realm® will be our online directory.  All Saints’ members who have logged in to Realm® will be able to see names and basic profile details for the people in our church, based on their privacy preferences. Print directories are out of date as soon as they are printed.  By keeping your information current in Realm®, you are helping our staff, group leaders and our church community.
• Giving – Review your giving history or make new donations online. Simply sign in to look over your year-to-date giving, check pledge progress, print a contribution statement, or make a new one-time or recurring donation. It’s always available and kept secure in an easy-to-use online environment. No matter how you choose to give toward our ministry – check, cash or online gifts – you can review all of your giving history online anytime.

Everyone in our church gets a unique profile. Your profile contains everything you want people in our church to know about you. Your profile includes contact information* (e.g. name, address, email, phone), photo, family members, personal information (e.g. marital status, birthday**, etc.).  Your profile also enables you to join a small group, RSVP to events, track your giving, update your contact information, change family details, set notification preferences, or replace that outdated family photo.

*You can decide later what data you want to share online by setting your privacy preferences.
**Feel free to enter your full birthday. The year and your age will not be displayed on your church directory profile.

A Note about Privacy

Your information is your information.

1. You have complete control over who can see your contact and personal information.
2. Contact information is never public or searchable on the Internet. Any information you elect to make visible to your church family is always protected behind a login.
3. Authorized staff will always have access to your profile information.
4. You and certain authorized staff may update your profile information. In some cases, your group leader may update your contact information if you have made it visible to group leaders.
5. For safety reasons, sharing contact and personal information for children under 18 is limited. Parents determine whether or not to display their child’s name in the church directory.
6. Children under 13 may not participate and will not be able to sign in.

What People May See

By default, the viewing of your contact and personal information is limited to members of groups you are in, group leaders, and staff members. If you choose to, however, you can make your information visible to the entire church. But if you prefer to be more private, you can customize how people see specific information*.

• Contact Information: Name, Address, Phones, and Email.
• Personal Information: Marital Status, Family Position, Member Status, but you also have the option of sharing your birthday, gender, and allergy information.

*If you are a group leader or host an event, certain contact information may be visible regardless of the settings you choose.

Each All Saints’ member will be able to access Realm® through the member portal on our website.  This means each member will need a personal email on file with the church to use as a login.  This email login will allow you to fully utilize all the features available in Realm® for an experience tailored just to you. If you do not have a personal email, it is easy to create one, and our staff and volunteers will be happy to assist you.

Over the next few weeks, we will be preparing to launch Realm® to the congregation.  We will be checking our database for emails we have on file, collecting emails that we need, and doing “soft launches” to certain groups within the church.  In the fall, we will announce when it is time to roll Realm® out to the whole congregation, and will have training seminars at the 10:00 am Sunday School hour for any parishioners who would like assistance.  We will also have helpers available during Sunday breakfasts, Wednesday lunches and Wednesday night dinners for several weeks while parishioners are joining Realm®.

This is an exciting new direction for our church family that will make it easier for us to connect with each other, keep up with what’s going on, and grow together as a community, and we look forward to seeing where the Lord leads us. Thank you for your participation!