A MESSAGE TO THE COMMUNITY

A MESSAGE TO THE COMMUNITY

At Pray.com, our mission is to grow faith and cultivate community. Pray.com is the easiest way to incorporate prayer into your daily life. We believe that when Christians make prayer a priority in their life, it has positive effects on their mind, body, and spirit, it also creates residual effects felt in our society. 

But that’s not just our opinion: Americans are showing that they crave prayer and faith-based content, especially in challenging times. According to Pew Research, more than 55% of Americans pray daily. And as 200 million American Christians were locked out of their churches, they turned to digital services like Pray.com to fulfill their need for daily guidance. This led to an incredible growth in Pray.com’s member base these past two years, which proves people want to make prayer a priority in their life. 

It feels like Big Tech doesn’t see it this way when they actively discriminate against Christian services like Pray.com. Nextdoor has denied Pray.com the ability to run paid advertisements on their platforms. This is truly unfortunate, as it not only alienates a large percentage of their user base during one of the most cherished Christian times of the year - Christmas - it also reduces awareness for Pray.com and the mental health benefits we have been able to provide during the COVID era.

You may have read about the story on Bloomberg.com

In a recent survey of Pray.com members, an exemplary 98% of people said that Pray.com has improved their quality of life, with 96% reporting a reduction in stress and anxiety and 82% reporting better sleep as a result of listening to our content. I believe this is the type of healthy, inspiring and modern product that people want to see advertised to them on Big Tech platforms.

Nextdoor asserts that 1 in 3 American households use their platform, which roughly translates to 70M Christian households. That’s 70M households that I believe are actively seeking Christian services like Pray.com. And with 80% of Black Americans identifying as Christian, one could argue that this discriminatory policy might disproportionately affect the Black community. To me, it doesn’t quite make sense to blacklist Christian services like Pray.com that has an 86 net promoter score, shares positive values, and demonstrates a positive effect on the well-being of its members.

The decision of Big Tech platforms to alienate Christians by banning the advertisement of Pray.com, the world’s No. 1 app for daily prayer and Christian meditation, is disappointing. But, our goal is progress, and we share this message optimistically to hold a meaningful conversation that creates a solution. Millions have embraced the power of prayer in their lives; we hope that Big Tech takes this knowledge and chooses to create a more kind, a more diverse and a more inclusive advertising policy that benefits people from all walks of life.

Sincerely,

Michael Lynn
Co-Founder, Pray,Inc.