Creating Culturally Responsive Faith Communities

A Continuing Education Session with Rev. Tate and Rev. Carolina Fuentes, LCSW

What does it actually mean for a congregation to be trauma informed?

It's more than a phrase we borrow from the clinical world and tape onto our ministry language. It's a posture — a way of noticing pain, honoring history, and building spaces where people don't have to leave parts of themselves at the door to belong.

In our upcoming continuing education session, Rev. Tate welcomes Rev. Carolina Fuentes, LCSW, for a joint conversation on what it looks like to build a truly trauma-informed congregation. Rev. Fuentes will offer a grounded overview of trauma-informed care in faith settings, including specific examples of how congregations can better support Latine/Hispanic members and communities — communities whose experiences of trauma, migration, family separation, and cultural dislocation often go unnamed in mostly white or English-first ministry spaces.

This isn't a session about doing more. It's a session about doing differently — with more attunement, more humility, and more room for the nervous system realities that shape how people show up to worship, to prayer, to community.

In this session, you'll explore:

• What trauma-informed care means in a congregational context and why it matters in communities that don't talk openly about trauma
• Practical, culturally attuned ways to support Latine/Hispanic members and families
• How compassion for others starts with compassion cultivated within yourself first
• A starting place for building communities of care that hold difference with dignity

Cultural responsiveness isn't a program to implement. It's a practice of paying attention — to history, to nervous systems, to the stories people carry into the room whether or not they ever say them out loud. This session is an invitation to begin, or continue, that practice with honesty and grace.

Join Rev. Tate and Rev. Fuentes on August 12th!

August 12 @ 9 am Pacific/ noon Eastern: Creating Culturally Responsive Faith Communities with Rev. Carolina Fuentes, LCSW Rev. Tate hosts Rev. Carolina Fuentes, LCSW in a joint session where Rev. Fuentes will give an overview of how to be a trauma informed congregation including some examples of supporting Latine/Hispanic members and communities. The discussion will offer a place to start in how you

Coming up later this Fall:

​Leading From Abundance (5 week virtual group program)

The 5 Tuesdays in September @ 10:30 am Pacific/ 1:30 pm Eastern: A virtual small group with Rev. Tate facilitating.

Lead from a place of strength instead of survival. Leading from Abundance is a 5-week virtual program helping clergy uncover their God-given giftedness, understand how stress shapes their leadership, and build sustainable, Spirit-led practices for the long haul, all with the deeper connection of a small group, from wherever you are. Discover what abundance really looks like and how to cultivate within yourself.

November 5, 2026 @ 1 pm Pacific/ 4 pm Eastern: What Happens When Leaders Grieve? with Rev. Dr. Rae Karim.

Rev. Tate hosts Rev. Dr. Rae Karim, a creative thought leader and visionary author. A certified grief coach and founder of Good Grief Now! a national 501c3 and full-service grief support organization that helps grievers successfully navigate their grief journey.