If you follow basketball, you’ve probably come across reels from H00PIFY, a mega popular sports account.
Creator Henry De Tolla is barely out of college, but his social media brand is a household name for basketball fans.
He brings together pop culture and sports coverage in a way that greatly resonates with a vast audience. His TikTok account has nearly a million followers, while his YouTube channel has more than 602K subscribers.
De Tolla has worked with Barstool Sports and a star-studded list of celebrities. He is even believed to be the person who popularized the “6-7” meme, which kids everywhere just can’t stop saying. (You caught our take on that, right?)
But recently De Tolla has turned his platform to something new — sharing his Catholic faith.
From H00PIFY to Faithify
De Tolla launched a new social media account on November 17. It’s called Faithify (well, faithify070) and he started it with a simple goal: to grow in his Catholic faith and share it with others.
In a video on the new account, he explained what inspired him to start it—his fourth social media account:
Welcome to my fourth account. I'm calling this one Faithify because on here I want to talk about my faith and my relationship with God. A lot of you guys probably don't know that I am religious, but I am Christian, Roman Catholic to be exact. And I started taking my faith pretty seriously about four years ago, and when I started doing well on social media like two years ago, I really wanted to start sharing more about my faith and about God.
He explained that he hesitated to share his faith on his main platform because he “never wanted to be the guy to shove religion down someone's throat,” so he decided to start this separate account so that his audience could choose whether or not to see that content.
There can be a natural hesitation when we see social media influencers share about their faith. De Tolla addressed this directly, saying:
I feel like a lot of the Christian influencers I see today, they're very intimidating. It's like, do this or you're screwed. I know a lot of people who watch me are just like me. You're just an average dude who wants to know God better and grow more in their faith. So I hope a lot of people will be able to relate to me on this account.
He’s taken the refreshing approach of sharing his faith as he learns, coming alongside his followers in a spirit of companionship and accompaniment, rather than acting like an authority.
While we look to the Church rather than social media for most of our spiritual learning, it’s very encouraging and heartening to see young people proudly sharing their faith online. It can help others feel less alone in being a person of faith, and may attract some followers to begin exploring Christianity for the first time.
De Tolla is kicking off his account sharing his experience reading The Action Bible, a graphic novel Bible that sticks closely to the original and is a solid choice for beginners.
You can follow along with his journey on Faithify, and we wish him all the best as he explores more deeply into his Catholic faith.
