DAVID ADAMS finds two apps, one designed to enrich your prayer life and the other to help you share your faith…
PrayerMate
With a simple, easy-to-navigate layout, this free app is aimed at encouraging you in your prayerlife through greater organisation. Designed by a British software engineer, Andy Geers, and launched back in 2011 (making it something of a veteran), it allows people to add their own prayer subjects – and organise them under themes (you can even simply import a list of names from your address book). And if you need some inspiration to get you started, there’s also a host of pre-loaded content and resources – including how to ‘pray the Bible’ as well as the prayer lists from various Christian organisations such as Open Doors, Operation World, the American Bible Society and Tearfund (there’s an accompanying website where, for a fee, organisations, churches or individuals can upload their prayer lists so others can see them). You can choose how many items to place on your list each day – it will rotate through a mix of your prayers and others – and one of the best features is the reminder alarm to keep you on track. Simple but effective. Now on Apple and Android.
Soularium
One of a suite created by US-based international outreach organisation Cru (formerly known as Campus Crusade for Christ), this free app is designed to help you engage in conversations about faith with those around you. Through a series of simple questions and use of 50 sharp photographic images, the user is is encouraged to lead someone through a conversation about their faith and “we’re they’re at”. It’s a low-key and fun way of engaging someone in such a conversation and you can SMS the photos a person chooses to them afterward so they have a record of the chat (and there’s a function for them to indicate if they’d like to talk again). Should appeal to students (which, given Cru’s university campus focus, shouldn’t come as a surprise). Available for Apple and Android.
