I'm The Bread Of Life - sung by St Thomas More choir, Subang Jaya

The theme of our Gospel readings for the past few weeks have been I Am The Bread Of Live.

I felt it apt to share this piece of beautiful hymn with all those who visit my Facebook page: http://facebook.com/creativecatholics as well as this blog.

I would like to thank my choir member Marilyn for once again doing a great job of converting her audio file into video so it can be uploaded here for everyone's listening pleasure.

In our tiredness of relying on our own strength, may we be reminded that Jesus is the bread of live.

The living food of eternal life!!! Amen!!!

Thanks to all the musicians and singers of St Thomas More 11.30am choir for sharing your talents so that everyone can worship God every Sunday.

You all are truly Creative Catholics.

P.S. Stay tuned for more music from our choir, thanks to Marilyn's great works.

Silent Auction To Stop The Silent Scream !!!

A REBEL WITH A CAUSE ... Christine Das is doing her thing - solo art exhibition and at
the same time promoting her Catholic-Christian values of highlighting PRO LIFE issues.

She has decided to help, in her own way, stop the silent scream of the voiceless
foetus in the womb who are being aborted every second, even as this blog
is written.

How?

Well, she has decided to generously donate one of her pieces to a silent auction in which
100% of the proceeds will go to fund the Human Life Services in Miri.

This non-profit organisation helps to counsel, offer shelter to unwed mothers as well as assist in the
adoption of the babies after they are born.

It also helps people become aware that abortion is definitely not the only option when
an unwanted pregnancy occurs.

This organisation is very close to my heart personally, as our beloved daughter
Mary Isabelle was sent to us from God through Human Life Services, Miri.

Christine said that minimum bid will start from RM3,500.

During her solo exhibition in MATIC, Kuala Lumpur, 20-25 pieces of her work
depicting nature will be displayed.

The main theme of the exhibition is her HOT for Nature series. However, her other work
like Pathways and Flock Together will be seen too.

"I use mostly vibrant colours to represent the happiness in life. There's already enough sadness
and negative things around. Even when I want to express a difficult moment in my life journey
in one of my Pathway paintings, I use purples and blues -not grey or black,'' she explained.

Christine said her work also gives a voice to the voiceless like the environment which is
currently being badly abused for profit.

Besides, her paintings, Christine will also launch her postcard series which are printed
recycled paper.

So block your dates and bring your friends (don't forget to come with your generosity
and your cheque book or credit card) to MATIC ART GALLERY, Hall 2.

At a glance:

Date: 3rd -28th Sept 2012

Venue: 109, Jalan Ampang, 50450 Kuala Lumpur
            Malaysia Tourism Centre (Matic)

Time: 7pm on the 3rd for the official launch.

P.S. btw, I nicknamed her REBEL WITH A CAUSE is because in today's world which the Culture Of Death is prevalent, standing up for LIFE will make her and anyone Catholic or otherwise a REBEL WITH A CAUSE.

More Merchandise

During this 3rd week of Lent, Creative Catholics has finally
come to live again after a long break. For those who have
been subscribing and following this blog, please accept my
humble apologies.

Last year was indeed a very hectic and busy year. What
took up almost half a year of 2011 was the staging of St
Thomas More - The Musical.

It was also a testimony that with God everything is possible.
How you may ask? Well for starters, due to desperation
and need, yours truly actually wrote four original songs
for the musical.

It still baffles me till this day. But as I said with God, all things
are possible even when others thought it impossible. So Tom
Cruise is not the only one who can handle a Mission Impossible, eh?

That brings me to the idea that since the musical was an original
idea and also four of the songs on it are, perhaps there is a way
to put them up here too since this is a blog to promote Creative
Catholics right?

Anyhow I discovered on Amazon that they have this service
called CreateSpace in which it helps writers and composers to
sell their original work with its help. I'm really excited about it.

For starters, to kick start this new label - More Merchandise
= everything and anything related to St Thomas  More, I've
created a carousel widget of books written by the saint himself
and also books others wrote about him.

There's also a medal you can order from them. So if you are
a Thomas More fan like me, here you go, check out my widget
on the right.

Once I checked out what CreateSpace can help me with,
perhaps I can put up the original songs from the musical here too.
Who knows, maybe even the recorded video of the musical?

Stay tuned for more from this blog. I pray to the Lord I shan't
be a slacker into the future, okay? Pray for me too, please.
Pretty please.

New Look

With the help of the new Template Design feature introduced
recently on Blogger, I decided to give my blog a new look.

Hope you like it. Please do come back again as I
just got Christine Das' permission to blog about her work.
As a teaser, she is the artist who has painted all the
new 14 stations of the Cross for our new church building.

Renamed, improved and on PayPal !!!

We are very happy to announce that this blog has been renamed Creative Catholics. It was formerly known as The Creative Catholic Centre.

Why? Well, one, I think it sounds better. Also some people spell centre (British style), while others spell it as center (the American way) so I thought I'd just eliminate the word. Spare everyone the confusion (not to mention lost traffic - just in case there was a verbal recommendation).

And that's that...

GONE INTERNATIONAL

I thank my God each time think how He sent some of the most unexpected orders my way. So far, I haven't really promoted this blog and most of the orders come from people who know me from church and my blog was just a catalog for them to check out how my knotted Rosaries look like.

A month or two into its existence, I started receiving orders from the foreign students studying here, who serve in Lifeline, our youth ministry. Before I knew it Cradle Creations has made its way into Indonesia.

Then, there's my very good friend Mama C, who left for New Zealand to spend Christmas there. She ordered 10 Rosaries and Crosses from me as presents for her nieces and nephews who live there.

(These are the 10 pieces of my latest creations in NZ)

I was already very happy ... never dreaming of my handmade pieces ever leaving Malaysian shores... then out of the blue, I received an email from a New Yorker....

That blew me away. This Catholic from Warwick, St Stephen's parish wanted to order my Rosary Wrist Bands - Garden Of Roses and the Christmas+Easter. I was so excited. However, I felt so ill prepared as I have not learned much about transacting money online.

God sent him to teach me something new and indeed He did. Somehow God even sent me a short 1-day FREE internet marketing course along the way - within my research time.

To cut a long story short, I finally settled on setting up a PayPal account and finally transacted with my new friend in NY. Thanks for your patience RL ;-)

With baby Mary in my life now (read my main blog if this information seems like Greek), time is indeed a priceless commodity, but I'm sure God will open up time for me in this new area of my life...

I will soon feature the other creative catholics and their products and services - in time for Christmas I pray.

So keep coming back...

God bless
Hazel

Birth of my online Catholic Shop

Since I started my first blog Through The Eyes Of A Cradle Catholic, April this year, I've been really facinated by what so many Catholics are doing in cyberspace especially in the area of spreading our faith.

They have mp3s for downloads, art, YouTubes and so on and so forth. I've decided that as a Malaysian cradle Catholic, I didn't want to be ketingalan zaman (left behind) and so here I am with my share of creative imput to help spread the faith.

For starters, those following my main Catholic blog will know that I've been hooked on making knotted Rosaries for some time. What started out as a hobby to raise funds for my new parish building - St Thomas More (Malaysia) has now turned into a burning desire to set up a small shop (well, online one for starters).

I've also met so many Catholics with so many different talents - business, performing arts, etc, etc, etc. I thought, this blog would serve us well (especially those who are not Internet savvy).

Anyway, if you would like to be featured in my blog, please email me (hazelong888@gmail.com) about yourself, your talents and what you would like to market thru this little online shop of mine. We'll work out a win-win situation, k?

Once again, calling all you creative Catholics out there, let's make lotsa money through our God-given talents and contribute towards building His Kingdom here on earth, before we pass on to the real Heaven....

Your fellow Catholic
Hazel