Christmas, Spirituality, and Stephen Colbert

I am proud to be Catholic, value the Catholic education I received, and look forward to providing my children with the same opportunity.  However, I do not wear my Catholicism on my sleeve and struggle with my Catholic identity.  Compared to my Catholic friends, I am just barely Catholic or even religious.  To non-religious friends, I am their Catholic friend. It's an odd place to be and often leaves me feeling conflicted.

The Christmas season always seems to intensify these feelings.  I feel like I approach religion with a healthy dose of critical analysis.  I get annoyed when people talk about how we need to put the Christ back in Christmas, although I agree Christmas has become way too commercialized.  My sister posted this comic on Facebook, and I thought it said it best.

I love the feel of the holidays.  This year I decided it was perhaps time to include a little bit more religious instruction so help alleviate the focus on presents.  It's hard after a month and a half of birthday.  This year I bought an Advent wreath.  Linus likes the blowing out the candles part.  I bought a book about doing Advent with children.  While I found some of it a little overly religious for my tastes, I did like that it had readings to do a Jesse Tree.  I have fond memories of doing a Jesse Tree in Mrs. Layton's 2nd grade class.  So, each night we have lit the candle(s), done the day's reading, and said grace.  This is actually a big deal because we hadn't been saying grace and I loathe leading prayer.

While I practice a more progessive form of Catholicism, Dave does not share my religious beliefs but supports raising the kids Catholic.  I haven't wanted to make him uncomfortable or annoyed, so we haven't done grace.  Well, Linus has loved saying grace.  He insists on holding hands.  This was great until last weekend when we went out to dinner with friends before zoolights.  When our food arrived, Linus wanted to do grace, a singing grace more specifically.  I admit I was a bit embarrassed yet I didn't want to confuse Linus by saying lets skip it.  So I found myself singing uncomfortably in the restaurant, in front of our friends.  Suddenly, I was finding myself anxious and thinking, "I hope they don't think I am suddenly conservative or super religious, I swear I am still the same person!"  Nothing like having a child put you on the spot about your religious convictions.

Enter Stephen Colbert.  A couple months ago, I caught an episode of the Colbert Report.  His guest was a Jesuit priest, who now has the role of chaplain of the Colbert Nation.  He wrote a book called, The Jesuit Guide to Almost Everything.  I heart Jesuits.  I find them, along with Maryknoll nuns, to have a more realistic and in touch view of the world.  I figured if the book was featured on the Colbert Report, then it might be worth a read and might even provide a little guidance.  I  enjoyed it and found it provided a lot of clarity for several struggles in my life.  The book spends most of the time on how to use and apply the Ignatian Spiritual Exercises in your life, even if non-Catholic.  The book definitely gave me a lot to think about and maybe a little more sense of peace in my life and with being Catholic.

With the current direction of the Church, I don't know if I will ever feel totally comfortable around my more "Catholic" peers.  But I am excited to provide my kids with a deeper experience of the holiday season.