August 7, 2025
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Thank you ahead of time for reading this long and much-needed newsletter from the Safe Environments Office. I would like to start off by saying that after 17 years of service at the Archdiocese of Detroit, Erin Taft has gracefully left the Curia. She will very much be missed. Please know that because of her tireless work over the past few years, this office is in sound shape. All inquiries, questions, and requests for clarification should be directed to me at pierson.maegan@aod.org or 313.237.5826 (this telephone number is also the direct line for the Office of Child and Youth Protection).
My second thank you is for all our local VIRTUS admin coordinators and background check coordinators. I know your job can be thankless and am grateful for every one of you and the gifts God has given you. Because of these gifts, many of you have come forward with great feedback about how VIRTUS could function better for your day-to-day usage and to make compliance more manageable. I have exciting news to share! We have some updates in VIRTUS scheduled for last week of August that we hope will help with automation processes AND Safe Environments is going to give you the skills to apply these functions in your day-to-day work. Here are the updates:
- VIRTUS will have a Background Authorization Form integrated into the registration system! What does this mean? When a first-time registrant creates an account, they will be required to provide their date of birth is, gender, race, and whether they have resided in the State of Michigan for the last seven years. They will also be prompted to sign and authorize a Background Check to be conducted by your parish/school. Upon completion of their registration, you will be able to pull all their necessary information from VIRTUS to conduct an ICHAT.
You may be wondering, “Well what about the other 500 volunteers who I already have in my system that need a Background Check conducted every two years?” VIRTUS will automatically email them 15 days prior to their Background Check Authorization Renewal and have them sign off on the Authorization Form for you to conduct another Background Check. Please note, it is important that all emails be up-to-date in VIRTUS, for this process to work effectively. For those parishioners who do not have email, you will still have to manually track them down, however, you can see in a compliance report when someone is 30 days away from needing another Background Check conducted.
- Recertifications for the self-paced, “Protecting God’s Children 4.0 and Vulnerable Adults 2.0” module. Starting in late August, all parishioners who need to recertify in PGC will receive an automatic email from VIRTUS saying that they have been assigned PGC 4.0 and Vulnerable Adults 2.0 and that it will be due within 14 days of assignment. Local Admins will also be notified when someone assigned to you has completed the module.
- VIRTUS will be conducted a mass deactivation (I will notify of the exact date in a follow up newsletter in two weeks) for anyone who hasn’t logged into their account since August 2020. We’ll be conducting this mass deactivation because the recertification is on a three-year cycle and anyone who hasn’t logged in to their VIRTUS account in five years is well out of compliance. I would like to note that this deactivation does not permanently delete users, and it will be very easy to reactivate anyone at any time. Going forward, Safe Environments will conduct these batch deactivations annually for anyone who hasn’t logged in at least 4 years.
In addition to all these updates, I am having Pat Neal from VIRTUS come to the Archdiocese of Detroit on October 15 to attend the Business Managers Peer Group to talk through all these changes. We will make sure that her slide deck and a recording of her presentation is available to all of you. Pat and I will also be conducting an online webinar in the afternoon/evening of October 15 for All Local Administrators and Background Check Coordinators to learn about all these features as well. This training will be recorded and available for all to view!
I am going to attempt to send out a newsletter every two months to keep us all updated and in the loop (plus the one I will be sending out in two weeks to give you all concrete dates as to when these changes will be live in late August). It is important that you share your feedback, joys, and frustrations with me on all Safe Environments subject matter, so that this Office can work for the people In Christ who do His good and just work.
God bless you all!
Maegan Pierson
