07-002 Prayer cards

07-002
Prayer cards

At the beginning of 2023, I did a little research on prayer cards.

Prayer cards

What are prayer cards?

Prayer cards are small pocket-sized cards that usually depict a saint or symbolic Christian scene, such as Jesus on the cross. The back side of the card has a prayer to encourage the owner to recite. These cards are used in the Christian tradition as devotional pictures for the use of the faithful.

Different Christian denominations have different traditions upon prayer cards. The circulation of prayer cards is an important part of the visual folk culture of Roman Catholics. Protestants are less devoted to religious items but prayer cards in Protestant theme do exist. Orthodox Christians used to be more devoted on small-size wooden icons. But things have started to change in recent decades.

I am not a Catholic. But I know what a prayer card is. I got one from a nun many years ago. It was in a book fair. The nun was distributing prayer cards to visitors at a Catholic booth. Since then, I keep the card in my wallet, treating it as my protection charm.

If you have read through my blog, you will find my sharing on American and German card games that I have enjoyed playing with my kids. Further, I have written about traditional playing game decks. I personally purchased a deck of each traditional playing cards and they are now sitting quietly on the little bookshelf in my bedroom. Kids don’t like traditional card games.

Why Prayer cards?

After finishing my research on traditional card decks, I moved on to other cards that are not for gaming but for something else, such as popstar photo cards. But one day when I was browsing through religious items on Etsy, some prayer cards drew my attention to.

The cards are nicely printed, with a similar size as a playing card. They are collectible and each bears an image of my religion. I decided to walk around local Catholic churches and bookstores to see if I can add some prayer cards to my collection.

My date with prayer cards

On the very first week of 2023, I started my adventure on collecting prayer cards. There is a Catholic bookstore just right next to my office, the Bonfire, which serves as an easy starting point of my adventure. To my surprise, I only managed to find 2 prayer cards in the whole bookstore. One is “The Lord’s Prayer” from a local publisher Rock Petrus. The other one is “St. Pio” from CBC, United Kingdom.

The first two prayer cards in my collection

One is from a local printer and the other is from UK.
Both cards are paper and sold in plastic sleeves.

“Prayer cards are not popular in Hongkong. These are all we got. And both of them were on the shelf for many years.” The storekeeper was correct. Rock Petrus was liquidated for more than a decade. CBC is still functioning though.

The Catholic Center in Central
These are only holy pictures, not prayer cards

Only a handful of prayer cards are sold there

On the same day, I went to the Catholic Center in Central after work. It is the only other and also the largest Catholic bookstore on Hongkong Island. “St. Cecilia”, “St. Lucy”, “St. Patrick”, “St. Anthony”, “St. Peregrine”, “St. Rita of Cascia”, “St. Pio”, “Chaplet of the Seven Sorrows of Mary”, “Our Lady of Mt. Carmel” & “Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal”… I found 10 different cards with images of a biblical figures or Catholic saints. In addition, 4 more cards are in prayer theme, “Confirmation Prayer”, “Communion Prayer”, “The Motorist’s Prayer” & “Magnificat”. With only 14 in total, I couldn’t say that’s a lot.

Cromo N.B. cards are plastic and in credit card size

Cards from the Catholic Center are either printed by Cromo N.B. of Italy or by Regina Press of the US. At the time of purchase, I had no idea who those saints are. Now I know, after searching the Wikipedia. They are all respectable persons of the Catholic church. 

Regina Press cards from US are larger in size

Prayer cards are not precisely cut.
Cards from the same manufacturer can be slightly different in size.

The other 4 Cromo cards are in gerneral prayer theme

On the next weekend, I decided to visit local churches to see if I can get some free prayer cards. I first visited the St. Peter’s Church in Aberdeen. To my disappointment, no prayer cards were found.

Prayer card from the Anglican church

Then I headed north to the Central and visited the Anglican church’s St John's Cathedral. As Anglican church is not exactly Catholic, I am not sure if they gives out prayer cards. Nothing was found in its bookstore but the church itself does give out prayer card, the “Dedication Prayer”. It is in post card size.

The "Dedication Prayer" card is billingual

I finally managed to get some ‘proper’ prayer cards from the Catholic churches around, the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception and the St. Joseph’s Church. I found that the cards given out by the churches are normally larger in size. Most of the cards are in postcard size and some are even bigger. They cannot be kept inside a wallet but can still be conveniently kept inside a Bible, if people still carry a physical Bible around. Some of them depicted the saint of their church, local saints or blessed people. And most of them are limited-edition. For example, the prayer card of “Bishop Alfredo F. Verzosa” from St. Joseph’s Church is a handmade xeroxed copy. Alfredo was a bishop of Northern Luzon, Philippines. The card is to call for prayers on his beatification.

Prayer cards of "St. Josef Freinademetz" and "Blessed Gabriele Allegra",
distributed in the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception.

Behind are their relics.

St. Josef Freinademetz was a priest in Hong Kong
Blessed Gabriele Allegra translated the Bible into Chinese

Both cards are postcard size, in Chinese language

Another Catholic church in Central, the St. Joseph's Church

Flyers and prayer cards at the reception

The handmade “Bishop Alfredo F. Verzosa” prayer card

On the week after, I visited many churches on Hongkong Island, small and big. I visited the Our Lady of Lourdes Church near my son’s school in the morning and went to the beautiful Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church near my office during lunch. I also visited the St. Anthony's Church in Happy Valley, the Christ the King Chapel in Causeway Bay, Our Lady of The Rosary Church in Kennedy Town, Our Lady Seat of Wisdom Chapel inside the Hongkong University, St. Jude’s Church in North Point & St. Anne's Church near the beautiful Stanley beach. From most of these locations, I managed to add a few prayer cards to my collection. 

Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Pokfulam

St. Anne's Church in Stanley

As I have nearly exhausted all the Catholic resources on Hongkong Island, I decided to continue my journey to the other side of the harbour. There are many Catholic churches in Hongkong and I am not planning to visit them all. But Catholic bookstores are only a few and the remaining are all located in Kowloon. I decided to visit them all and the churches nearby.

I first visited the Catholic Center in Tsim Sha Tsui and grabbed some more Cromo cards. The Rosary Parish Rosary Church nearby also gives out free prayer cards. The other Catholic Centre in Mongkok also sells prayer cards but the St. Teresa’s Church next door has nothing.

St Paul Media Centre is a very small shop ran by The Daughters of St Paul, located inside the shopping mall Pioneer Centre. They also sell prayer cards. The Talentum Bookshop nearby sells nothing, though. And the real hidden gem is the Salesian Catechetical Centre.

St Paul Media Centre also gives away this unique two-folded prayer card

Venerable Sr. Thecla Merlo is the founder of Daughters of St Paul

Not exactly on a convenient location, Salesian Catechetical Centre sells a huge collection of prayer cards, together with a lot of religious items. You can find prayer cards from different printers worldwide, but the majority are from the 3 Italian printers – EGIM srl, Fratelli Bonella and Cromo N.B.. Some cards are in Italian language. I am not sure how local Catholics can make use of the prayers printed on them.

(from left to right) Cards printed by EGIM s.r.l.,  Fratelli Bonella and Cromo N.B.

EGIM cards are paper and the cheapest
But some of them are in Italian

Some of the remarkable prayer cards are those 3D cards from China. The printer is called Szvictor, probably located in Shenzhen. Cards are in Chinese language and bear 3D graphics. Szvictor is not exactly a Christian publisher. It prints many 3D cards and religious figures only belong to one of their product lines. They also print 3D image of Buddha in A4 poster size.

3D prayer card, looks like Jesus is watching you!

Cards are printed in Chinese

Other remarkable prayer cards are the 2 from R Italy. The medals on the cards are not just gold paints but real. The medal is laminated together with the card and I don’t think it is supposed to be taken out.

The medals are real

Just like normal prayer cards, a prayer is printed on the backside

The most interesting one must be the prayer card of “Our Lady of Lourdes”. It is not an ordinary prayer card. A small bottle of holy water from Lourdes is attached to it. It is the only card in my entire card collection that contains liquid.

“Our Lady of Lourdes” prayer card, with a bottle of holy water from Lourdes

The backside is a prayer in Chinese

The Mary Help of Christians Church nearby also distribute prayer cards for free. Some of the cards look very old and limp. Seems Catholics would like dispose their unwanted prayer cards back to the church for others to pick up.

How much is a prayer card?

A normal prayer card ranges from HKD $0.6 (EGIM srl) to $8.0 (Cromo N.B.), which is around 10 cents to 1 USD. The “St. John XXIII” prayer card with medal by R Italy costs $10.0, which is around USD $1.25. The “Our Lady of Lourdes” prayer card with holy water costs a bit more than USD $2, HKD $17 to be exact.

Many comment prayer cards as cheap and affordable. This statement is actually arguable. Yes, the cheapest card I get is only HKD 60 cents, which is nothing. And the most expensive card, the one with a bottle of holy water, only costs a bit more than 2 bucks. Their prices are really affordable. But we are only talking about 1 card here. If talking about per-card price, then a pack of UNO is now selling at USD 10.75 on Amazon and you’ll get 108 cards with a tin box. Are prayer cards really cheap? It really depends on your point of view. 

How to start a prayer card collection?

Prayer cards are popular collectible items especially in Catholic countries. They are inexpensive, small in size and do not take up much space of storage. Cards are beautifully printed and have many different patterns on them. Collectors base their collection on various criteria like a favorite saint, country of issue, issuer, etc. Most of the cards depict images of famous religious paintings. One can learn the history of the paintings while collecting them.

Most of the religious images are in public domain

Same image, same prayer, printed by different printers

Most of the religious images and prayers are in public domain and can be freely printed or replicated. These cards are produced in large quantity. Some cards are rarer, such as the handmade “Bishop Alfredo F. Verzosa” card I got. Funeral cards are also limited edition. Collecting them is rather a hit-and-miss. The funeral card of “Fr. Tommy Murphy” I got from the Immaculate Heart of Mary Chapel is an example.

The funeral card of “Fr. Tommy Murphy”
Opposite side is "Our Lady of Sheshan", 
a title of the Blessed Virgin Mary venerated by Chinese Roman Catholics.

You can start your own collection from your local Catholic bookstore. Most likely, you will find a wide range of prayer cards there. Or, you can visit your local parish. There is no guarantee but normally, you will be able to get some prayer cards free. And that is one of the reason I like visiting Catholic churches. You can just go there at any time, grab some cards (if any) and leave. No one will bother you. Do the same in Mormon temple and you will end up being surrounded by groups of latter day saints, eager to make friend with you.

How to store prayer cards?

I saw on internet, someone is selling binders with plastic sleeves for prayer cards collection. I think this would only work if you are from the states. In my country, prayer cards are in different sizes and it is impossible to find a binder that can fit them all.

I get this pouch from Redbubble to store my cards. Redbubble is a global online marketplace for print-on-demand products based on user-submitted artwork. Artists create designs and submit them digitally to Redbubble. Upon receiving orders, Redbubble will print the artwork on a variety of products, including t-shirts, phone cases, stickers, etc. and send the product directly to the customer.

Pouch to store my prayer card collection

The pouch I got is designed and sold by hispanicworld. It is in Catholic theme and depicts the image of “Our Lady of Guadalupe”. Size is 12.5” x 8.5” which can hold up to a hundred prayer cards in different sizes.

 

In the next post, I will talk about some other special prayer cards and my opinion upon them. Stay tuned!

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