WHY WE STARTED URBAN CATHOLIC

Welcome to the first Urban Catholic Blog post! We wanted to introduce ourselves to you and give everyone a more personal view of why we do what we do.

 

My name is Marcus Wells, and my wife Adrienne and I have three beautiful and amazing kids (Elijah 8, Ryleigh 6, and Caleb 3)! My favorite job that I have been gifted with, is to be a husband and father. It is fun, challenging and rewarding.

                                                          

We decided to start Urban Catholic near the end of 2019. Our vision for this e-commerce store is more than just to sell awesome Catholic gear, but to also spread the faith to those that may not hear it as much, help those who do hear it often to keep up the good fight, and to "bring Catholicism into the 21^st century" if you will. For so many years the Roman Catholic faith has been viewed by many as a faith “for old white people”. Well as most of you know, that is not the case. As a “millennial” I often hear talk of this and I think, “well that’s not entirely true because I am Catholic but I am neither old, nor (fully) white. These people need to recognize!” The tides have begun to turn. More and more young adults and youth are either coming back to the faith, or finding it. For the longest time, I have felt passionate about representing my faith to others through my actions, sometimes what I say, and other times through what I wear. Thus, the reason I decided to start Urban Catholic.

I grew up in the city/suburb environment in Ann Arbor, MI (Go Blue!!!), and Adrienne grew up in Metro Detroit. We both are committed to being in the world but not of it. Our definition of an Urban Catholic is someone like us. We love hip hop and classic rock music, and we watch The Office (a lot!) and Marvel movies. We go out with friends and drink beer, we (okay mostly I) yell at the tv during sports games. We are however, also very involved in our parish in Lansing, Mi, (the capitol city!....too bad it’s not the electric city….Office reference 😊…) we send our kids to Catholic school, are raising our kids in the Catholic faith, and hang out with fellow Catholic friends weekly. We go to mass weekly (sometimes during the week too), confession as often as we can, and pray the divine mercy chaplet and the rosary. We model our lives and, most everything we do around Christ and his Church.  So, given all of that, we are, as we see it, “devoted modern day Catholics”.  

This is the reason I wanted to create products that are in the world, but are not of it. For all of you beer drinking, tattoo having, hip hop loving, Mary devotional, God fearing, Eucharist adoring, saint aspiring Catholics, our designs are for you. And if you did not make our “list of examples”, our stuff is for you too!  

On our site you will find snapback hats, shirts that are both for the bold in faith, and for those that want something a little more subtle. Mugs you can drink your morning coffee in, and maybe even strike up a conversation about God with a fellow co-worker, and beer glasses you can end your day with or hang out with on the weekend.

                

                                                                                                                         

Each product we have has special meaning to us so when we create a product, it will have significance hopefully not to just us, but will relate to you as well. If you follow our blog, you will hear about the significance of each in an upcoming entry.

Lastly, since music is one of the things that inspires me, can help me change or maintain my mood, and can also be used to give glory to God, I will end each blog with what I am listening to each week. I hope it opens you up to new music, helps you worship God, and get an insight into why we do what we do here at Urban Catholic.

 

Songs I am listening to this week:

Song: Struggler

Artist: Brother Isaiah

Album title: Poco a Poco 

I just found this song and album, not soon before finishing writing this blog entry, and I can’t get enough! The whole album has a calm, reggae, almost Jason Mraz type sound. It is awesome to find a Catholic artist, not to mention he is a Franciscan Friar as well! Give this song a listen to be reminded that God is with us all as we struggle through life.

 

Song: Like You Do

Artist: Roy Tosh (feat. V.Rose)

Album: Like You Do- Single

I’ll be honest, I have listened to this song every day for the past week! I watched the music video (must see), and behind the scenes too. This is the first I have heard of Roy Tosh, but this song has got me interested in the rest of his music. It is just a fun song, gets you in a good mood, and reminds us that God’s Love for us can come at the right time when we least expect it or deserve it.

 

Song: Paid My Dues

Artist: NF

Album title: Paid My Dues-Single

I love NF! If you like Eminem you might like NF better. NF doesn’t use bad language or talk about sinful things like most mainstream Hip Hop. This song follows his most recent album “The Search”. This song is him responding to some of his critics. I like NF because he talks about real things, talks about God (does some collabs with some other Christian hip hop artists) and is just an overall good artist. This is a good song to add to your running or workout playlist! I will probably have him in this segment of my blog often because I love a lot of his music!