The Anglican Movement website has recently become one of the many around New Zealand to become a shielded site. Shielded sites allow victims of domestic abuse to access a portal where they can find out ways to become safe, but without their abuser finding out about it in their browser history.

The Shielded Site Project is an initiative of Women’s Refuge, and any website can join in. “People visiting our website can now click on the grey and white icon at the bottom and access help without putting themselves at risk,” said Duncan Brown, diocesan Communications Advisor. “When I saw this project and how easy it was to add the shielded site button to our website, it was a no-brainer. Our churches offer people sanctuary in a physical sense, now we can offer sanctuary through our digital platforms.”

Duncan says that it was an easy process to add the shielded site portal. “There are instructions for most major website platforms at shielded.co.nz - and that’s all I had to do, follow the instructions,” he said. “Parishes could even add it to their own websites and soon, all of our churches could be offering sanctuary to those who really need it.”

If you’d like to see how it works, scroll to the bottom of our website and click the grey and white screen icon. A message will pop up inviting you to enter the portal. To find out more, go to shielded.co.nz and follow the instructions there.