Lay Catholics sell books, videos as service to Church

Along busy Lavender Street near downtown Singapore is an unassuming store with a plain sign that says “Wellsprings Catholic Books.” Inside the shelves are crammed with books, CDs and religious items.

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Peter Hong, owner of Wellsprings Catholic Books, in his store

Peter Hong, a convert to Catholicism, runs the store. “In 1990, I was looking for a Catholic book and I couldn´t find it, even after searching many bookstores,” he recalled. Three years later, he set up Wellsprings.

The bookstore has come a long way since then. It now sells books on the Internet and supplies books “to other Catholic communities in southeast Asia,” Hong says. The online catalogue currently lists 15,000 titles.

“Our competitors are no longer parish bookstores — they are websites such as Amazon.com, where millions of books are available,” he observed.

Hong struggled at first to run the bookstore, because Wellsprings did not receive financial assistance from the Singapore archdiocese. Though he earns less than what he used to as an engineer, he feels rewarded in other ways.

“It has been a great joy running the bookstore. Books are like signposts pointing to God and have the power to change lives. Despite many challenges, we´ve survived for 16 years!” he said proudly.

His personal approach to relating with customers also has survived.

“This is not only a business, it is also a ministry,” he remarked.

The community spirit is evident in the way Hong will locate and import books that customers suggest to him. Additionally, they “can make orders over the phone and simply pay for them when they arrive.”

Another privately run media supplier is Noah´s Ark Creations, set up in 1996 and situated in Chai Chee Lane, eastern Singapore. Owned by Gerardine Yee, a mother of five in her 50s, Noah´s Ark focuses on Catholic faith formation programs, such as Great Bible Adventure and Little Rock Scriptural Studies from the United States.

“We provide a lot of video-based material for all ages,” Yee said, assessing the store´s strength.

Yee´s motivation was similar to Hong´s. She first saw the need for such a business when she had difficulty finding a “Catholic alternative” to secular merchandise. “For example, if I were choosing a T-shirt for my child, I could buy one with an action hero on it or I could choose one with a biblical character,” Yee explained.

She believes that formation materials such as those Noah´s Ark supplies are essential for Catholics to grow in faith.

These Catholic stores owned by laypeople supplement what is available through stores run by the archdiocese, Religious congregations and parishes.

The archdiocese´s Catholic News Book and Media store aims to make theology and pastoral resources accessible to Catholics. The archdiocese also runs Carlo Catholic Society, another bookstore.

The Daughters of St. Paul, an international Religious congregation with a charism of evangelizing through the media, runs a bookstore at the Church of the Risen Christ. The nuns frequently participate at secular book fairs and set up booths at shopping malls as a form of evangelization.

Most parishes also run small bookstores manned by volunteers on weekends. They serve Mass crowds and typically sell books on spirituality, obtained from the main Catholic bookstores, as well as items such as rosaries, and religious calendars and pictures.

Don Gurugay, who works at Catholic News Book and Media, says there is hardly any tension or competition between the Catholic bookshops. In his view, “As long as privately owned businesses do not misrepresent themselves and claim to be associated with the archdiocese, it is fine.”

Yee sees her business as providing a useful service to parish organizations by supplying “material for parish ministries to run their programs.”

Hong likewise hopes Wellsprings “will continue to help people grow spiritually.”