ORUUC is now using a new church management system called Realm. This system keeps track of all of our congregants and groups, simplifies communication between them, and allows congregants more control over their gifts to the church. We encourage you to use this new system.

Benefits

The heart of this church is the many groups that have been formed to embody our values and mission. Joining a group is easy: You just send a request, within Realm, to join a group. The group leaders get the request and either approve or deny it. If approved, any further messages will automatically come to you as a new member. You can quickly send messages to your whole group, without needing to keep an email list for each group you belong to.

If you change your email, communications from other people or groups will come to you automatically.

You can access the Realm system through your computer, at https://onrealm.org/oruuc, or through your mobile device. (See below for how to obtain the necessary app for your phone.)

You can post messages and photos to the groups to which you belong, and you will receive notification, on either your computer or your mobile device.

When you create an event in Realm for your group, that event can be seen by anyone who uses Realm. Think of it as a little more advertising.

Each group’s profile includes a description of its purpose, it’s meeting times and location. As new people join the church, they can check out this information to get ideas about how to get involved.

Group members can post messages and photos to the group’s news feed.

Every group has a knowledge base that should be passed on to subsequent leaders. This rarely occurs, and when it does it is often a document that no one knows where to save. The Resources tab for each group is the perfect place.

Getting Started

To get started with Realm, you first need to create a Realm login account. You should have received an email that looks like the following. If you haven’t received one, just call the church office and we will resend the email. Click on the link, and you will be taken to a site that asks you to create a password for getting into Realm. There are rules for the minimum length and complexity for your password, and those rules will appear next to where you enter the password. When you have entered a password that follows the rules, the text box’s outline will change from red to green.

When you’ve done that, look for a second email that gives you a link to follow to verify your email. This is just a second level of security that Realm uses to make sure that you are really you. It may ask you to verify your phone number.

Once you have gotten into Realm, you will see a screen that looks much like the following. The left-hand side has a menu with the following items.

Communications: Contains links for the various ways in which you can communicate with other people and groups in the church. You can find instructions for communicating with members and groups in he Resources section

News: Shows any news that has been posted to groups that you belong to. It also gives you the chance to post news items and photos, or schedule an event.

Inbox: The Realm inbox is where you receive messages from your group leader, and send messages if you are a group leader. You can read and reply to these messages and customize the message notifications Realm sends for each of your groups. The Inbox tab will show you any recent or archived group messages. .

Chat: The Chat tab is where you can start a chat session with anyone who has a Realm login account, not just the members of your groups.

Events: Shows all of the events that have been scheduled by other people or groups, as long as they have made them public.

Giving: Allows you to see all of the gifts that you have made to the church, make new gifts, scheduling recurring payments, such as automatically through a bank account, update your pledge information, and generate a tax statement.

Groups: Shows all of the groups to which you belong and gives you the opportunity to join other groups.

Directory: Shows everyone in the church who has agreed to have their information listed in the directory.

Editing your profile

In order to allow others to reach you, it is important that you keep your information up to date. In Realm, this information is called your profile. To edit your profile, click on your name in the top of the window and choose My Profile. On the screen that then appears, click on Edit Profile. You will be able to edit all of your contact information, like address and phone number, as well as personal information, like birthday.

Finding people and groups

It is very easy to find both people and groups in Realm! Just go to the search box at the top of every screen and start typing in the name of the person, either first or last, or the name of the group. As you type, the names that match will be displayed. In the example shown below, two people are listed because of a match to their name, and one group is listed because one of the leaders of that group was a name match.

 The Mobile App

To download the mobile app, click on the following link. You will have the choice of getting either the Apple or Android version.

https://www.acstechnologies.com/products/realm/features/connect-mobile-app