Set the audience and review path for church prayer requests

Someone asking for prayer should know who will be able to read the request.

That choice shapes the experience before anyone responds. A request intended for a small pastoral team needs a different audience from one intended for the church. Make those options understandable at the moment of sharing.

Explain the available audiences

TheFaithApp’s Prayer Community supports the church prayer wall, an eligible community group, church leaders, and the authorized pastoral team. The church feed is scoped to that church. Leaders-only and pastoral-only requests stay out of member prayer walls.

Explain anonymity separately

An anonymous feed request hides the requester’s identity in the feed. The audience choice determines who can read it. Do not use anonymity wording to suggest that every kind of request is invisible to the people responsible for reviewing or caring for it.

Review before wider visibility

Approved requests appear in the eligible member feed. Pending and rejected requests remain out of it. When an active approved request is edited, it returns for review. Give reviewers a clear operating rhythm and a way to handle content that needs a smaller audience.

Keep pastoral requests within their boundary

A pastoral-only request uses a restricted workflow, with the member’s identity available to authorized pastoral caregivers for follow-up. Its content does not appear in prayer walls, prayer-team digests, or general exports. That audience cannot be switched after submission; a different audience requires a new request.

Let the requester return to the story

Members can revisit their requests, mark one answered, add an optional testimony, or withdraw it from member feeds. They can also keep a separate private prayer journal when they do not want to share.

For leaders, the launch conversation can be simple: “Choose who should read this. We review requests before they appear in a member feed. A private pastoral request follows its own restricted care path.”

Prayer reminders and an “I prayed” response can support a shared rhythm. Urgent follow-up is a request to the church team, not an emergency service.

Save this explanation for your prayer-team training.

Explore the workflow

Read the Prayer Community guide. Try the live demo. Request access for your church.

For the broader planning approach, read the prayer follow-up guide.