Now here’s a very cool idea!
A group of Catholic moms in Omaha have been producing priest trading cards in an effort to promote vocations and raise some money for the Omaha Archdiocese Seminarian Fund.
“We wanted to take something secular and put a holy twist to it,” said Diane Anderson, another of the moms involved in the project. “We wanted to make it personal, something fun, but something holy as well.”
Vankat and Anderson, along with Lori Mellender and Cathy Hula, said they wanted a fun way for children, particularly boys, to not only participate in a popular hobby, but also learn about local priests and pray for them. They also hope the cards will foster vocations to the priesthood.
They’ve already had great success in raising funds—they anticipate earning about $20,000 at the end of the project. Though this particular project is local to Omaha, it’s a model that would easily be copied in other areas of the country. The moms in this project used a custom trading card company to produce their cards.
Volunteers gathered information about the priests, took photos, and sold the cards. No cards were made without the priest’s permission, of course. And some of them were thrilled.
Father David Korth (pictured), a former baseball player, was especially happy to participate in the project.
Father Dave Korth said the project is a dream come true for him. A former baseball player at Mount Marty College in Yankton, S.D., Father Korth said he always wanted to have his own trading card. He likes to see people develop new ideas on how to encourage vocations.
There are obviously some very smart moms behind this project. I think the idea is an excellent one and I hope it will catch on in other areas of the country. Kids love to collect cards. What better way to increase awareness of our priests, encourage prayer for them, and inspire young people to consider vocations to the priesthood—all while raising money to support seminarians?
Way to go, Omaha Moms!
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Knowing Melia VanKat and a few of the other moms - I am not surprised at its success and quality!!! Hurray for them, their diocese and the Church as a whole!
Very creative!
What a fabulous idea! These are lovely cards and the moms (full disclosure: one of them is my daughter!) worked so hard to produce and market them. I have been amazed at the amount of interest and $$ these cards have generated - these homeschooling moms of large families are DYNAMITE!
Thanks so much for blogging about our project! It has been such a labor of love for our priests and very uplifting to see the kids collecting and getting so excited to learn more about our holy priests. Our website is www.stvianneycards.com St John Vianney, pray for our us.
My family has had a lot of fun collecting the cards. I think the National Catholic Register should do an article on it, perhaps other dioceses would
like to follow their idea!
Thank you for blogging about the Priesthood cards. The four of us moms have been so blessed by working on this project. It has been a joy to meet these holy men and to introduce them to the children (and adults) of our Archdiocese. St. John Vianney, pray for us!
Great idea!! I have wanted to do this for years and did not have a clue how to go about it! Good on ya for pressing forward. My collection is in a thick photo album that I update regularly! God bless.
Fr. Koth uses Fire Spin. It’s not very effective.
Bulbasaur uses Razor Leaf. Fr. Koth fainted!
I would be interested if the same can be done for nuns and sisters (or are they basically the same these days).
That being said, every parish in every archdiocese should be in on this.
Worth noting: There is at least one major-league baseball player who went on to become a Catholic priest—Allan Travers, who pitched in a game for the Detroit Tigers in 1912.
After purchasing a couple of pkgs for our son, he brought out his action figures, cut out some vestments from the scrap bag and set up “Mass” in his room. His sister joined in and we are amazed watching them take off with this wonderful idea. Thanks, ladies!
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