As we hear from all of you time and again, the work we do here is more important than ever. Where else can you find the stories we cover and the analysis we provide? Where else do you see news of the crisis interspersed with essays of why we fight and what is beautiful about our faith, in order that we might work together to restore it?
I think it is fair to say that there is no other Catholic apostolate like OnePeterFive. With your help and by God’s grace, we have become the loudest voice advancing the cause of Catholic tradition online. We reach hundreds of thousands of readers every month. And every month, we do our best to speak to the heart of the issues that matter most to Catholics around the world.
And now we are reaching out to you again to ask you to join us in our mission.
As of this writing, we have raised only $3,600 of a $20,000 goal for the month of June. As of yet, we have not hit our fundraising goal even once this year. We understand that times are difficult, and people have limited means. I support a family of ten people on the work I do here, so I understand. We’ve had good times and bad since we started 1P5, but we do our best to be faithful to God and put the rest in His hands.
We understand that other Catholic publications are currently engaged in major fundraising campaigns. We know that they’re trying to raise in the span of just a few weeks what we need to run for an entire year. And we understand that you want to support every initiative that is doing important work.
All we ask is that you prayerfully consider any tax-deductible contribution, no matter how small. Most of the donations we receive are not large, but they have power in numbers. In just the past 7 days, we’ve had nearly 50,000 unique visitors. If every one of them gave only 50 cents, we’d exceed our goal. (I know you’ve heard this before, but it really is true!) We encourage you, if you’re able, to set up a monthly recurring donation, so that you only have to enter your information once. These can be cancelled at any time.
If you’d like to help — even by giving 50 cents — you can do so by clicking the button below, and you never even have to leave this page:
(And of course, for those who prefer not to donate online, you can always do so by mail.)
To those of you who have already donated — and who are always there to keep us going — thank you! We absolutely cannot do this without you.
Remember that we have Masses said for the previous month’s benefactors on the 2nd of every month, according to the 1962 Missal. I’m pleased to announce that we’ve now added a second Mass each month for ALL benefactors. We can think of no better way to show our gratitude for all you do for us.
God Bless you, and thank you in advance for your generosity and prayers.
In Christ,
Steve Skojec
Publisher & Executive Director
OnePeterFive
Just two quick points for readers here: [1] Don’t be afraid to donate online. Long ago I was, but I’ve learned that it’s much easier than finding an envelope and addressing it, writing out the check, looking for a stamp, etc. And it’s safe. In all the time since I began using “electronic donations” to charities, monasteries, and sites like 1P5, I’ve never encountered the slightest problem. [2] Unless you and I are willing to defend our faith with actions as well as words, our enemies will win, and we will soon find ourselves living in a land where authentic Catholicism will be as scarce as it is in North Korea. Steve and others are doing their part. The least you and I can do is to give them the means to continue the fight.
Steve–It would be a whole let easier to contribute if Paypal was directly available. As it is every month I contribute all my information must be filled out as required by your procedure. Also, I like your .50 cent idea. Everyone one who uses your site should be able to do that every month and hopefully a little more. You could even have a campaign to play some how on the 50 cent theme.
If you set up an account in the donations section, you never have to fill it out again (unless your credit card expires.) The switch from Paypal was made due to the concerns of some readers regarding Paypal’s pro-LGBT business practices.
The automatic process does not work on this site when using Paypal which is offered as a way to pay. Steve should just let you pay with Paypal without having to go through the redundant process of providing the same address info each time you give.
But, gee, how hard is it, and how time consuming to just fill it out again? What’s the rush in life? So it takes 3 minutes each time. Doesn’t seem like much of a problem. Again, what are we rushing towards? I have closed my paypal account because my credit card has been hacked three times in two years. I suspect my activity on paypal may have opened this opportunity to those who simply spin numbers to find a live one.
I’m not able to contribute regularly, especially with the terrible exchange rate re Canadian funds vs US funds, but when I do now I’ll have to go through the agony of using up 3 minutes of my valuable time to do so. Maybe I can offer this up?
Barbara–All I’m trying to do is improve the process. Personally, I give a good amount every month and the time wasted is no problem for me. I’m not concerned about myself but how others might react unfavorably.
Michael, first, thanks for being such a constant and loyal contributor. You’ve been with us from the very beginning!
I have to apologize for that process. I’ve actually asked the developers of our CRM about it, and they gave me the runaround on why it’s happening. I’m going to bring this back to them again.
In the meantime, you can do so directly by going here: https://www.paypal.me/1P5
If you end up using that, please let me know right away. Paypal has something called IPN — Instant Payment Notification — and it is supposed to ping our donor software to let it know something has come in and it should track it. I’m just not certain it will work with every transaction, and I wouldn’t want your record to be missing anything when tax time comes.
Thanks Steve. I just used https://www.paypal.me/1P5 to send you a donation. It worked fine.
Thank you. And it is showing up in our system, but it looks like it made a duplicate record for you because you didn’t go through the normal gateway. I have a bad feeling that’s going to happen every time.
I can merge the records so it shows up. But I’m going to keep after the developers to issue a fix for this. With credit card payments, it’s a single sign-in and you don’t have to fill it out again. Seems like there’s a lot working against PayPal these days.
Steve–I think I will set 1Peter5 up for an automatic Paypal payment each month. OK? I like using Paypal because it gives me more control.
That’s fine, and thank you. I apologize for the trouble. Too many pots on the stove, and some of them I don’t have the recipes for.
Steve,
As a pastor I know how hard it can be to get donations during the Summer months. Collections, at least in parishes where people are not vacationing at, tend to be much lower. People tend to spend more money on activities the summer and so may not think as much about donating.
Please, everyone remember that the Parish and sites like 1P5 still have bills during the summer.
God Bless,
Fr. RP
Thank you for the option to contribute to this important work by CHECK !
You have my prayers and my little donation. May God reward you for what you do.
I have made you a couple of small donations and am grateful for the work you do. I have done the same with LifeSiteNews.
BUT. There is a problem.
You quite correctly use tax deductibility as a selling point.
But that doesn’t work for me in the UK. There are of course limits as to what I can donate, and I need to consider which is the the best way to use the money that I have.
Tax deductibility for me means that I can donate £3 to a worthy cause in the UK for every £2 that I don’t donate to an overseas worthy cause.
So whilst I would love to give more to both you and LSN, it may not always be the best use of scarce resources.
Totally understandable. Thank you for the support you’ve been able to give. We very much appreciate it.
I donated a bit, but one thing I think a lot of people miss are two things: one is a quick thank you email even an automated one, is really nice and two is that little money really does add up. I think you understand the last one and I know that you are grateful, but when people thank us for our gifts, big and small it really does inspire me even more.
Hold on – are you telling me you didn’t receive one? I agree that this is extremely important, and I want to know if we’re missing any of these points of contact. I used to personally thank every donor. As the number of people has grown too large to make that possible, I’m forced to rely on the system and I respond to folks where I can.
If you didn’t receive something, I’m sorry – let me say than you right now. I want to figure out right away why this isn’t happening.
That’s okay. I don’t think I did, but now I doubt myself. (Please excuse muddled brain of mother of 11!) I need to figure how I paid and what email I used etc. I will go look at my other email address and see and try to remember how I paid etc.
Mea Culpa, Steve. It totally is there with the receipt. I’m so sorry. I took my frustration of not getting thank you’s from other places out on your comment section and I was so wrong. I’m sorry! Yikes! Thank you for the THANK YOU!!
No, it’s fine. I’ll tell you a true story.
I once had a priest I know donate a significant amount of money when we were really struggling, back in our first year. I was so grateful that in addition to the note I know he got from our system, I also sent him a personal thank you, because I was so humbled by his generosity.
Months went by, and then, all of a sudden, he said something to me about how hurt he was, because what he had given was a really big deal to him, and he’d never done anything like that before, and he didn’t even hear a peep.
I went back and looked and saw that two emails had gone to him — both the automated one, and the one I sent — and I told him about it.
As it turned out, he had an old email address associated with his PayPal account. He wasn’t getting the notifications because of a technicality. He had unfortunately been feeling neglected for a long time at that point.
I do whatever I can to try to eliminate these possibilities. I want every person who contributes to this enterprise to know how much they are appreciated. I have developed this habit of going through every notification I get that someone has made a donation, and saying, “God bless you, (insert name here).” It’s a little thing, but it keeps me accountable for gratitude, and for asking God to bless those who take care of us.
If our donors feel unappreciated, it’s totally my job to fix it. I’m glad you brought it to my attention. Far better than to let it go on longer without knowing. And thank you again!
No, it’s a huge deal to do that. It means a lot. It probably was a big deal to that priest. I’m glad he said something so that he could see that it was actually acknowledged. It does mean a lot for you to do that and I actually I remember notes from you in the past. Most of us don’t have a lot of money to part with so when we do (even if it’s a small amount like mine truly was…good Catholic boarding school for one child, good Catholic college for another, seminary for one, food and water for the rest) well, it all adds up and so giving can be a challenge; however, I really did want to support you in a small way because what you are doing is very big deal and not many others are sounding the call as you are. It means a lot that you are willing to fight the battle so I want to fight in my small way with a little gift and lots of prayers–those are pretty little too!–I guess my big problem is technology or spaciness or something. Yikes. 🙂