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Here’s the deal – I love Christmas. It’s always been my favorite time of the year. Advent is my second favorite time of the year, simply because it’s about getting ready for Christmas. Usually I start playing Christmas albums well before its time. Usually my tree goes up the weekend after Thanksgiving, and usually my secret santa schemes are in full effect by December 1.

But not this year. This year I have yet to put up a tree. This year my secret santa received only the bare minimum of attention and this year the Christmas albums have yet to find their way to the stereo.

I’m not entirely sure what has been sapping my holiday cheer. There have been Christmases in the past when I’ve had reason to be glum. Family members in the hospital, weather keeping me from getting home, empty chairs around the table. But this year I’ve just been in a funk. An arbitrary, non-descript funk that’s had me gazing squarely at my navel and ignoring the still, small voice of the Spirit. Last week I confided to a friend that for whatever reason I just haven’t been able to get on board with Advent, and that I have been seriously concerned that I’m going to wake up in about six weeks and suddenly find myself in the Christmas mood – only to realize that this year I missed the boat.

But tonight I received the gut check, and the heart check, that I so desperately needed, courtesy of Mr. Stephen Colbert. While many of the jokes in his Christmas special were the kind of funny that I’m not proud to laugh at, I do believe that the best humor has power because it forces us to look at truth with new eyes. It was his take on an old song that woke me up to the wonder I had been ignoring this year. And so this year my “Christmas card” to you is this…

This Christmas may you know peace. This Christmas may you know love. And this Christmas, may you know understanding.

All good things,

cHRIS

Too many thoughts for a tweet, but I’ll point one here.

• Welcome Home - Gene Monterastelli & Brad Farmer made it a point to welcome the family home again.  So good to be back!

Dr. Dean was both inspiring and challenging.  She pointed out where youth ministry has been lacking, and she pointed to ways we can do better in the future.  Some points I came away with:

• What was important about the NSYR research was not the info it found about teens, but that it framed the problems of young people as the problems of the Church.  How many prophets do you know personally?
• “The Church exists by mission as fire exists by burning.” (Emil Brunner)
• Are we sharing what we believe - or are we sharing who we love?

My thoughts, after a couple hours of chewing….  The Church is the Church, and will always be the Church, thanks be to God.  Some (if not many) of the ways we “do” church, however, are broken (this is not news). 

Some of the ways we do church will lead to their own eventual elimination, mostly through attrition.  The only thing wrong with that is the number of people who won’t get served in the time it takes these dying ways to pass away. 

There is hope for the future, and we have the gifts and the talents and the wisdom and the drive to bring about change.

These are my random, un-polished thoughts.  What are yours?

Today was a day of travel for the National Conference on Catholic Youth Ministry.  This is the earliest I’ve ever gone out, but I can already tell it was a good choice.  The Conference doesn’t officially begin until Thursday evening, but I have a meeting tomorrow morning @ 8:00am, a pre-conference tomorrow from 1-6pm, then NACYML Biennial membership meeting Thursday morning.

As I was waiting at the airport (for a shuttle which never came, grrrrr), I had the pleasure of witnessing a mom greeting her son as he returned from a tour in Iraq.  What a site.  No words were spoken, just a hug that went on forever, and a look that said more than words ever could.  Couldn’t help but be happy seeing that.  Got me to thinking though….  If a mother is capable of such an intense and profound love for her son, how much more deeply and powerfully must God love each of us?  If a mother’s eyes can say so much when they see her son coming home, how much more must God long for each of us to return to him.  What a tremendous gift to love a God who loves me so much more than I could ever comprehend.

Speaking of hugging, I hadn’t been in the hotel more than 2 minutes before I was sharing hugs with an awesome group of old ministry friends from around the country.  Add that to the hug I got in the airport from another old friend, and I’m kind of starting to feel sorry for folks who are coming to this conference not looking to get hugged.