Trauma-Informed Worship: Guidelines for Intergenerational Worship

The following guidelines are appropriate for clergy, worship leaders, and lay participants in worship to use in both scripted and extemporaneous announcements, prayers, testimonies, children’s messages, and sermons. We encourage congregations to discuss these guidelines in a worship planning and/or worship committee meeting, add or adjust anything particular to your community, and keep the document where everyone can access it when planning, writing for, and leading worship.

Guidelines for Addressing Sensitive Topics in Intergenerational Worship

Examples of Sensitive Topics (non-exhaustive list)

• Graphic/explicit violence, especially toward women, children, and people of color; violence toward animals
• Graphic/violent death, especially mass death, genocide, and war
• Hate speech and extreme bigoted sentiments
• Rape, sexual assault, and harassment
• Abuse (torture, sexual abuse, child abuse, animal abuse)
• Self-harming behavior (suicide, self-inflicted injuries)
• Eating-disordered behavior or body shaming
• Drug and alcohol addiction
• Bullying or strong abusive language
• Destruction of property and loss of life from natural disasters

Addressing Sensitive Topics with Children in the Room

• Use general language about what happened in specific places. For example, “Merciful God, we pray for families and friends who are grieving and feeling uncertain and defenseless in Strawberry City, Indiana.” (Strawberry City, Indiana is a made-up location.) While the adults in the room will know the specifics of what happened, children will hear that we pray for people who are hurting without being given specifics they are not ready to process.
• Remember the purpose of prayer and preaching is telling the truth about who God is and how God acts and seeking guidance for how we can cooperate. Specifics about violent or otherwise disturbing events and realities are not as important and can detract from these purposes. For example, when speaking about war during a sermon with children in the room, our work is to point to God and God’s work among us—God’s peace, justice, mercy, work for the flourishing of all creation, and so on. It is not the work of worship to focus on the details of what happens in war, especially when children for whom that information is too much to process are in the room. In worship, we point to God and what God teaches us to do in response to war and other sensitive topics.
• Focus on what you want God to do and empower the community to do with and on behalf of children. For example, “Loving God, we pray for the safety and well-being of all children. Grant us the wisdom and courage to prioritize the well-being of children in our community, our nation, and around the world.” We want the children in our congregations to hear our hopes and commitments for and with them and all children during worship, not introduce fear and anxiety about unfamiliar, unknown, and scary realities that are too big for them to comprehend, particularly when violence occurs at places that are familiar for children, like schools or daycares.

Addressing Sensitive Topics with Teenagers and Adults

• Have a standard content warning statement that allows people to tend to their mental health before specific discussions of sensitive topics. Some examples include:

• During the __________ (sermon, prayer time, etc.), there will be a brief mention of _________(sensitive topic). If that is a difficult topic for you or your family to hear today, you may want to take a bathroom break or get a breath outside for a few minutes.
• I want to take a moment now to discuss _______ (sensitive topic). If that topic is not cool for you today, we understand. Please feel free to go outside and fellowship with others or take a bathroom break until you hear the piano transition us to ______ (the next part of worship).

• When possible, offer a content warning multiple times. Include a note a few days in advance through your church newsletter and/or social media, then repeat it at the beginning of service and when you come to the moment when you will discuss the sensitive topic in detail.
• When it is not possible to do so in advance, offer a content warning in the moment. Frame the warning as an invitation to tend to one another’s well-being. Give space for people to transition out of the space before you begin the discussion and consider how you will help the whole congregation transition back into the flow of worship. Remember that with a few repetitions, practices like this can become routine and expected aspects of the community’s rhythms. At the same time, advance warning is always preferable.
• Remember that the pastoral staff, worship leaders, and parents are partners in tending to the well-being and spiritual growth of children and youth in the congregation. Host conversations with parents to listen to what they’re concerned about their children and youth hearing and learning about in worship. Ask for their input on how they would like these topics discussed in the congregation, both inside and outside corporate worship. Help parents feel secure in knowing that the church’s worship leaders are paying attention to the needs of their children and recognize their children as vital participants in worship.