Catholic Online Boutique: Complete your shopping list by buying the finest in Catholic this year

From the volume of activity, we know some of you have discovered the Catholic Online Boutique and are already shopping there. For those of you who may be missing out, we'd like to introduce you to our new Boutique where you can shop for the finest in Catholic products.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - Catholic Online Boutique has been open for a couple of weeks. We have been filling the store with merchandise and other offerings and we haven't commented publically about it since we weren't quite ready to do so. Now, the dust has settled and we're ready to welcome all of you to the Catholic Online Boutique.

If you have clicked any links at the bottom of our stories recently, or answered the call to assist victims of Typhoon Hiyan/Yolanda or answered Pope Francis' call to end world hunger, you have visited the Boutique already.

You will see that the Boutique is constantly being updated with new products. Our most recent addition is prayer candles, which appear on Catholic Online. You can see the first candles by clicking here. What's great about these candles is they last as long as you like and they can be viewed anytime. They can also be shared via Facebook, email, or other means. Just copy and paste the link to your candle and your friends can view it too. It's a great option for those special intentions, and for sending blessings to people who are far away. Even from halfway around the world, you can tell someone you care by lighting a candle for them and sending a link so they may view it.

For now, there's a little lag time between your order and their appearance on the site. In all cases, your candle should appear within 24 hours, or as little as a few minutes. This is because all orders are processed and reviewed to prevent spam. We envision this becoming quicker in the coming months. We will also add social sharing buttons so you can share your candle without having to cut and paste the link yourself. We are certain that you will enjoy your candle on Catholic Online, knowing that our faithful prayer community joins you in your special intention.

Another popular offering is Catholic Team Global apparel. Catholic Team Global is a worldwide, secular fraternity of Catholics who are proud of their faith, their Church, and Pope Francis. When you wear your Catholic Team Apparel, you're making a statement that you belong to the vanguard of worldwide team of faithful believers that totals more than one billion souls.

Catholic Team Global apparel is great for church groups, sports teams, and other organizations, especially charitable teams. Next to the apparel offerings, Catholic Team Global is supporting Pope Francis' call to end global hunger by providing VitaMeal packs to those in need. Each VitaMeal pack can feed a child 30 meals with complete nutrition. Catholic Online is teaming up with Your Catholic Voice Foundation for the effort, which means your purchase of VitaMeal packs is also tax deductible.

Download 100's of Prayers for free

A third major component of the Catholic Online Boutique are the donations for emergency and disaster relief, as well as donations earmarked to support your favorite areas of the site. Catholic Online plans on growing these various areas of the site by updating the look and feel of the pages, rolling out easier navigation, and adding ever more content to satiate your interest in all things Catholic. A donation to one or more of these areas gives you a stake in helping to grow the site and keeping it vibrant for a lifetime.

Donations for emergency and disaster relief are also key components of the Boutique and are processed via Your Catholic Voice Foundation, which makes your donations tax deductible. Emergency relief provides aid in a variety of situations where people suffer personal emergencies that don't generally make news headlines. For example, your donations could provide charity via Catholic Relief Services which works to support people at all times in all communities.

Disaster relief is collected for victims of specific disasters such as earthquakes and typhoons. Your Catholic Voice Foundation has already been successful at generating thousands in donations for people impacted by events such as the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan and Typhoon Hayian. Your donation in this area means we can provide swift relief to people in these areas, typically within days of the tragedy, and possibly much sooner.

In the weeks to come, Catholic Online will add many more products to the Catholic Online Boutique. Coming soon will be over 6000 saints' medallions and other items that are popular with our readers.

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