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THE PROSOCIAL STORY
BEGINNINGS
An Interview Sparks a Realization
In the fall of 2018, Alexander Lang had the opportunity to interview the religious scholar Reza Aslan for his podcast. During that interview, Dr. Aslan said, “What’s happening in America is not that people are becoming more secular. It’s that people are turning away from traditional religion towards alternative ways of experiencing transcendence.”
This has been confirmed by a Pew study that found “70% of U.S. adults can be considered ‘spiritual’ in some way, because they think of themselves as spiritual people or say spirituality is very important in their lives.” Therefore, even though religious affiliation is declining, many of the people who identify as spiritual are still interested in pursuing offerings that will guide or enhance their spiritual journey.
Yet, if these seekers are unwilling to engage with religious institutions to explore their spiritual curiosities, where will they find information and guidance? Alex set out to provide an answer to this question.
PROSOCIAL IS BORN
Two Key Insights
Alex's first key insight was discovering that the primary reason why seekers are abandoning religion is because they don’t want an institution defining what they can and cannot believe. They want spirituality on their own terms where they can explore spiritual ideas that feel relevant to them without the judgment or strict doctrine of a religious community.
The problem right now is that once a spiritual person disengages from their religious community, they are on their own to research and find resources. More importantly, these resources are diffuse—websites, social media, books, lectures. This can be challenging and overwhelming even for the most knowledgeable seeker.
This led to Alex's second key insight: There is no centralized repository where a person can easily search for spiritual information and find spiritual leaders to guide them along their journey.
It was from these two insights that ProSocial was born.
FROM IDEA TO REALITY
Creating a Spiritual Platform
Alex envisioned a platform where you have endless options at your fingertips; a platform where you could indulge your every spiritual whim without judgment or need of prior knowledge; a platform that connects spiritual seekers with spiritual leaders.
Alex realized that in order for this platform to become a reality, he would need to get representatives from the major religions around the world to become invested in ProSocial's creation.
Alex's background as a pastor and his time studying religion at university and graduate school makes him particularly well suited to gather this unique group together. The ProSocial Advisory Board will not only establish how the platform should function for all these various religious and spiritual entities, but also procure leaders to create content for the platform.
The current goal is to have hundreds of leaders signed up with ProSocial by the end of 2025 so that the full application can be built in 2026 and publicly deployed in 2027.
Our Journey: Past, Present & Future
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