April 8, 2026
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
NEW: Fingerprinting Vendor Webinar
The Office of Safe Environments will host a webinar for parishes and schools who wish to have fingerprinting machines on-site. This webinar will take place on Monday, April 27 at 1pm. The agenda will include what it means to be a vendor, the cost of a machine and other fees, training needed to be a vendor, charging for fingerprints, scheduling times for fingerprinting at your parish and school and more. Please feel free to register HERE
NEW: Fingerprinting Updates
The Office of Safe Environments and Compliance is working diligently towards rolling out our Background Check Policy that will include the updated Criminal Convictions Policy combined with our new fingerprinting policy. Please know that this will be coming out soon along with updates on timelines for fingerprinting certain categories of individuals and other fun website updates as well. Currently, we are only fingerprinting clerics and employees of the Archdiocese of Detroit. If you would like to have us come out and fingerprint your employees, please email me at pierson.maegan@aod.org. Due to some logistics and the number of people we can roll, we are currently slated to begin booking in July of 2026.
NEW: Make-Up USCCB Audit Webinar
Due to technical difficulties, there will be an additional USCCB Audit Webinar on how to complete the survey, run a C/D compliance chart, and enter the numbers for Empowering God’s Children. The date and time for the training are as follows:
- Thursday, April 30th from 3pm-4pm (sign-up HERE )
All trainings will be recorded and available to watch on both the Teams channel and linked in the resource section of this newsletter as well. Please know I am working on getting the other two recordings up and will have them available early next week.
** RECORDING FROM 1/21 HERE
2026 USCCB Audit
The 2026 USCCB Audit Tool is LIVE. Please read through the information below to make sure your parish and/or school are set up for success:
- Please complete the audit form and return it no later than June 1, 2026 at 5pm. All parishes and schools who submit after June 1, 2026, will be considered non-compliant.
- If your parish and school are separate entities in Virtus, please submit one form for each entity.
- The Safe Environment Office of the Archdiocese of Detroit will report the numbers for priests, deacons, and seminarians.
- For the 2026 audit, fingerprinting is required only for educators and employees of a school entity.
- Please review our policies for training and screening for the Office of Safe Environments HERE
We will only accept numbers from your C/D compliance Chart in VIRTUS this year. Your VIRTUS database must reflect the current spreadsheet you are holding for compliance. Please note: It is important that you upload the most recent BGC date you ran for an individual into VIRTUS.
Access the Audit Form HERE
If you need to schedule a time to meet with Maegan Pierson, Safe Environments Manager, about any of your compliance needs, please do so HERE
Thank you all for your endless patience and care towards upholding the safety of children and vulnerable adults. Each one of you has done incredible work, and we look forward to continuing to make a difference in our parishes and schools.
Child Abuse Prevention Month
April is Child Abuse Prevention Month. As part of our due diligence, this month is an opportunity to reflect and promote awareness in our communities to make a difference.
In 2025 alone, The Office of Safe Environments trained; 6,906 new individuals in Protecting God’s Children and recertified over 15,000. In addition, thanks to our teachers, catechists, and directors of religious education, we trained 27,845 children in Empowering God’s Children.
By creating cultural awareness and promoting this vital work, we can teach children and adults what it means to have healthy relationships with one another and foster a community that protects and looks out for one another. We would like to take this opportunity to thank and recognize everyone who play a role in Protecting all of God’s Children.
Carrying this sentiment, this week we are featuring an article titled, "The Importance of Child Abuse Prevention Month - All Year Long" by the VIRTUS Program.
Please feel free to post this article on your Safe Environments webpage as additional resources.
In addition, you will find some links with lots of great information below. We kindly ask that you take a moment to read through the materials and to post the flyers in visible places at your parish or school. Please consider posting in the parish bulletin itself, a physical bulletin board, or anywhere else that you regularly post announcements in your parish or school. The more we do on our end to raise awareness of this critical mission, the better our chances of building Safe Environments in our respective communities.
Bulletin Communication
There have been some questions about how to best inform our volunteers about the AOD requirements for Protecting God’s Children. I impart to you the gift of an updated bulletin communication. If some of you have bulletin communications, you have found to be helpful in your parish or school, please email them to pierson.maegan@aod.org
Merging Locations in VIRTUS
If you would like your parish and school to be one entity in VIRTUS or there are a number of parishes that submit as one entity for the USCCB Audit, please email Maegan at pierson.maegan@aod.org and we are more than happy to help you make this happen 😊
