Have you ever told someone “I’ll pray for you!” and then forgot to pray for their intention after a day or two?
Have you ever donated money to a great cause and wanted your prayers to be part of your gift, too?
A groundbreaking new web app was built for moments like these, offering one united place to share prayers, encouragement, and donations. Think of the best features of crowdfunding sites like GoFundMe and CaringBridge, but leading with prayer first — and all with a distinctly Catholic approach.
PleasePray is the new intercessory prayer and charitable giving platform for Catholics. Calling themselves, “The Communion of the Saints activated in prayer,” PleasePray makes it easy to share an intention and then invite others to accompany you in prayer, while offering a place for almsgiving to lighten financial burdens with dignity and care when needed.
The platform offers a 3-step plan to assemble the prayer warriors in your community around an intention:
1Share your intention
Create a prayer page for any need — healing, discernment, a loved one, a community cause. And you can choose a saint as your intercessor, including asking for the intercession of a Servant of God on the road to canonization.
2Rally your community
Invite friends, family, and your parish to join in prayer. Watch the communion of saints made visible, one prayer at a time, through PleasePray’s prayer tracker and messages of encouragement and support.
3Add fundraising when needed
When a situation also requires material help, the same page can include fundraising so prayer and charity stay connected in one place.
Why PleasePray?
Husband and wife Carlos Espinoza Banegas and Carolyn Madigan Espinoza are the cofounders of PleasePray.
Carolyn shared with Aleteia what sparked the decision to start the platform:
It started when our friend in South America was diagnosed with a terminal illness, and when we asked how we could help, she asked us to go through the intercession of Blessed Guadalupe Ortiz. Friends were trying to count daily the number of prayers to give her a sense of real spiritual accompaniment.
My husband said, “I can automate this process and make it much easier for people to share,” and then from there, other people asked for a visible prayer tracker too. We realized there wasn’t anything like this that was in line with Catholic Social teaching in terms of almsgiving, that is, charitable giving to worthy causes, leading first with the most effective form we know for any type of need—prayer.
Espinoza reported that the platform has logged more than 15,000 prayers so far along with 1,600 users since it opened four months ago, an incredible witness to its quick growth and Catholics’ desire to “storm Heaven” for intentions that matter to them.
She said many users appreciate that the site has an option to remind them to pray, so that specific intentions can stay at the forefront of their minds even as time goes on and life gets busy. Users are encouraged to “pray it forward” and pray for others—as the Communion of Saints prays for them.
“Friends of the (Future) Saints” conversations
An especially unique feature of the site is its webinars and conversations around living a holy Catholic life. One series is called “Friends of the Future Saints” and features interviews with family members, friends, and others who knew men and women whose causes for canonization are open.
The first interview took place on May 23, 2026, with Concha Alvira, the youngest daughter of Tomás and Paquita Alvira, a Spanish married couple whose cause for canonization is currently underway.
Upcoming seminars will feature conversations with the family of Servant of God Pedro Ballester and the daughter of St. Gianna Molla.
You can register for these events for free here on PleasePray.
