Privacy Policy

Last updated October 12, 2026.

St. Verena's Service (St. Verena's Corp) is a faith-based nonprofit rooted in the Coptic Orthodox tradition that serves homeless, hungry, and vulnerable people. This policy explains what we collect through this website, including visits, messages, newsletter sign-ups, and donations, and how we use it. Section 11 covers our app, on your phone or on this website. By using the site you accept these practices. We may revise this policy and will post the new date when we do.

1. Information we collect

Information you give us: contact details and messages, newsletter sign-up details, donation details such as name, email, mailing address, and amount, and, if you apply for an internship, the details you enter in the application form, such as your contact details, education, experience, and written answers.

Information collected automatically: IP address, device and browser type, pages visited, referring sources, and cookies. We do not knowingly collect data from children under 13.

2. How we use it

We use information to respond to inquiries, review internship applications and contact applicants, process donations and send tax receipts, send updates you opted into, improve the site through anonymous analytics, and meet legal obligations. We do not profile visitors automatically or use data for unrelated commercial purposes.

3. Payments and donations

Donations are handled by third parties such as PayPal, or by check or cash. We do not store full payment card details. We receive limited information such as donor name, email, amount, and transaction ID. We do not sell donor information.

4. Sharing

We do not sell or rent your information. We may share it with service providers working under contract, when the law requires, or in a merger or transfer of the nonprofit. Donor acknowledgments may involve internal sharing with volunteers or clergy.

5. Cookies and tracking

Essential cookies keep the site working, and analytics cookies may be used to understand usage trends. You can manage cookies in your browser. We do not respond to Do Not Track signals.

6. Data security

We use reasonable safeguards, and our payment processors are PCI-compliant. No method of transmission or storage is completely secure.

7. Data retention

We keep inquiries and subscriptions as long as needed or until you unsubscribe. Donation records are kept at least seven years, then anonymized. Analytics data follows the provider's retention terms.

8. Your rights and choices

California residents have rights under the CCPA/CPRA to know, access, delete, and correct their data. Residents of other regions may have similar rights, such as access, erasure, and objection. You can opt out of emails with the unsubscribe link or by contacting us.

9. International transfers

This site is hosted and operated in the United States, so your data may be processed there.

10. Third-party links

External services such as PayPal and church resources follow their own privacy policies.

11. Our app

The St. Verena's Service app for Android and iPhone, and the same app on this website at stverenas.com/app, let you browse services, drives, community events and our website pages without an account and without giving us anything.

Accounts. You need an account only for some features:

• Volunteers can create a free account with their name, email and a password to RSVP, check in at services, log volunteer hours, get an hours letter and apply for an internship (internship applications need a school email ending in .edu). We email you a link to confirm your address.
• Partner organizations can ask for an account to request events with us. If we approve it, we email the username (the organization's email) and a temporary password, which must be changed at the first sign-in.
• Passwords are handled by Google Firebase Authentication and kept only in encrypted (hashed) form. St. Verena's never sees or stores them. You can reset your password by email at any time.

The phone app and the website version use the same accounts, so you can sign in to either one.

What the app stores, and why.

• Account details: for volunteers, your name, email and, if you add it, your phone; for organizations, the organization's name and type, contact person, email, phone, website, city and how it wants to work with us. We use them to know who is serving or asking, to contact you and to match your hours to you.
• Your RSVPs (which service and date), so we can plan headcounts.
• The times you check in and out of a service, so an organizer can verify your hours, and the hours you send with Log my hours (where and when you served, as you type it, and how many hours).
• Hours letters you get in the app: your name, your school if you added it, and the dates, services and hours on the letter, with when it was made. We keep a copy so the school or group you give it to can check it: the letter's QR code and link open a page that shows that copy to anyone who has the link. The link is a long random code, so a letter can't be found without it. Our team can withdraw a letter, and the page then says it no longer counts.
• Event requests from organizations: the event details and the on-site contact, so our team can review and plan them.
• Internship applications sent in the app: the answers on the application form (contact details, school, availability, experience and any links you add), so our team can review them.
• Sign-in details kept by Firebase: when the account was created and last used, and whether the email is confirmed.
• Notes our team keeps about volunteers, organizations and requests, visible only to St. Verena's team.

Notifications. If you turn on notifications in the phone app, Google Firebase Cloud Messaging gives your phone a notification ID. On iPhone, Apple's push service is used together with Firebase. We use it only to send St. Verena's announcements. RSVP reminders are set on your phone and are never sent to us. The website version does not send notifications.

What stays on your device. The camera is used only to scan the organizer's check-in code, and only after you allow it. The pictures are processed on your phone or computer and never uploaded. Adding an event to your calendar happens on your device: the phone app adds it to your calendar, and the website version downloads a calendar file for you to open. Your PDF hours letter is made on your device too, and you decide where to share it; the copy we keep for checking it is described above. Listings you save in Resources stay on your phone, or in your browser on the website. The phone app keeps copies of website pages you opened, so they work offline. Both versions keep you signed in until you sign out, and hold hours you log while offline until they can be sent; on the website, your browser keeps these.

Where it is kept, and who sees it. Accounts and records are stored in Google Firebase (Cloud Firestore and Firebase Authentication, United States). The page that checks hours letters is served by Google Firebase Hosting. Security rules let you see only your own records; St. Verena's team (our admins) can see and manage all of them. Our team also keeps copies of accounts, requests, applications and hours letters, and the volunteer hours record, in Google Sheets in St. Verena's Google account, and receives requests and applications by email at Volunteer@stverenas.com. Only our team can open them. We don't sell or share your information, show ads, or use analytics or tracking in the app. The website version is a page of this website, so the cookies and analytics in section 5 apply to it as they do to our other pages. All data is sent over an encrypted connection. Donations open PayPal, and the app never sees your payment details.

Deleting your account and data. Volunteers: in the app, on your phone or on this website, open Contact, then My account, then Delete my account. This permanently deletes your account, your details, RSVPs, check-in records, hours letters (their check pages then say the letter can't be found) and any internship application you sent in the app. Hours already added to our volunteer hours record, and emails we received, stay until you ask us to remove them. Organizations, anyone who can't sign in, and anyone who wants everything removed: email Volunteer@stverenas.com from the account's email address and we will delete the account and your records within 30 days. We otherwise keep volunteer records until you delete them or ask us to, so we can confirm your hours later, for example for a scholarship. Uninstalling the phone app removes what it saved on your phone. On the website, signing out and clearing this site's data in your browser removes what it saved there.

Ages. The app is meant for volunteers 16 and older.

12. Contact us

Email Volunteer@stverenas.com or call 919-537-1249.