Hallow: Silicon Valley's $105 Million Catholic Prayer App

A Catholic prayer app raised $105 million in VC funding, hired Mark Wahlberg, ran a Super Bowl ad, and hit #1 on the App Store — beating TikTok and Netflix. How did rosary beads become a tech unicorn? Topics covered: - How Hallow 'baptized' the Calm/Headspace wellness playbook with traditional Catholic content - The Notre Dame founders who went from McKinsey and Goldman Sachs to selling the rosary - Peter Thiel, JD Vance, and the politics of faith-tech funding - The 'liturgical engine' — why Hallow grew while secular wellness apps crashed post-pandemic - Celebrity endorsements gone wrong: the Liam Neeson and Russell Brand fallout - Is gamifying prayer the new evangelization or the new indulgence? Timestamps: 00:00 - Introduction 01:00 - The staggering numbers behind Hallow 02:30 - UX breakdown: wellness app meets ancient tradition 04:30 - The founders: McKinsey to monastery 06:00 - $105M in VC from Silicon Valley's conservative elite 07:30 - The liturgical engine: why Lent beats 'Stress Awareness Month' 09:00 - Mark Wahlberg, the Super Bowl, and celebrity risk 11:00 - Culture war crossfire: critics from left, right, and academia 14:00 - 40% non-Catholic users and the case for digital evangelization 15:30 - Can you scale prayer without losing its soul? This episode was produced with NotebookLM from research by Claude. This podcast episode was generated using NotebookLM's audio overview feature. The source material was researched and curated by the host, with AI assistance in audio production.