Pro-life crowdfunding and Catholic Netflix

By Thomas V. Mirus ( bio - articles - email ) | Feb 20, 2017 | In On the Good

I’d like to call our readers’ attention to two worthy new enterprises which look to fill significant gaps in the Catholic internet.

First is a pro-life crowdfunding site called WonderWe. At first I wondered what the need for such a site would be, but as it turns out, mainstream sites like GoFundMe and Kickstarter have often taken down pro-life campaigns while allowing pro-abortion ones (even fundraising for a specific individual’s abortion). Of course, you can start a WonderWe campaign for all sorts of projects, not just (in the narrow sense) pro-life ones. I saw campaigns to raise funds for Catholic schools, for earthquake relief, and for individuals’ medical treatment. One more thing—unlike many other crowdfunding sites, WonderWe does not take a percentage of funds raised (though there is a standard, third-party credit card processing fee on each transaction).

There’s also now, for lack of a better description, a Catholic version of Netflix: Formed. An enterprise of the solidly orthodox Augustine Institute, Formed is a monthly subscription service giving access to a plethora of Catholic video, audio and book content. It looks like Formed has an excellent collection of content so far—not just catechesis and apologetics programs, but also a great selection of films. Think the sort of content you’d find in the Ignatius catalogue—CCC cartoons for kids, documentaries about the Church, feature films about saints, etc. There is also a sizable Spanish-language selection. For an individual this costs $9.99 per month (comparable to other streaming sites), but Formed also offers an option for parishes that gives access to all parishioners.