When we were little, we were fascinated by our religion. We used to play church all the time. We used oyster crackers as communion and the brothers were our priests. Me and my sisters were the nuns and of course, Mary was always the cranky Mother Superior. We would spray each other with holy water like vampire hunters. Our religion became a hysterically holy play put on by heathens.
Which brings me to our family fun event. Today I worked on planning Keegans Baptism. Catholics get baptized out of the womb but since Keegan was adopted his baptism will happen now. Here lies the problem...little man hates being center of attention so this baptism thing may be a bit difficult to pull off. He is going to have to be center stage and get water poured on his head.
When I told Keegan about his baptism he vehemently was against it.He was horrified when I told him what happens. Oh great, this is not going to be good. All I was envisioning was Keegan kicking the priest and running off the altar and out the church doors. So, what is a mom to do?
Well, I could chastise him and make him do it. Tell him I am the boss and get on with it. I could coddle him and bribe him with sugary delights. I could reverse psychology him and tell him that fine, kiley will get to be baptized if you don't want to. But, then I remembered I am the fun mom....lets play baptism.
I gathered up my boys and filled a bowl with warm water. I then let them perform "baptisms". We got out some oil for the sign of the cross, too. Keegan went first. He looked a bit confused at first but then I dripped some water over his head. He started to laugh...hard. Then he got to "baptize" Shawn. Shawn gets bonus points for his theatrics. Shawn "baptized" Dylan and had great fun thoroughly soaking his brother. By the time we were all "baptized", I had all my boys begging to be dipped again!
We then read the story of John the Baptist who was Jesus friend. He got to baptize him just like the brothers. We talked about the prescence of the holy spirit and how baptism gives you an abundance of grace. Grace is the armor that helps keep your soul clean. We talked about how when you sin, you dirty your soul. When you are born you have original sin on your soul (thanks Adam and eve!) but, when you are baptized that sin is scrubbed away. We wrapped it up with a rousing rendition of "you gotta take that sin right outta your soul!"
And, this is why it pays to be a fun mom. My boy is now beyond excited for his baptism and my boys will now get to play Catholic. Hopefully they will look back on this and remember how much fun it was being brought up Catholic. We Catholics get a bad name for our rigid, uniform services but at moments like this I remember why I love my religion. These traditions have provided a great base of faith for my kids. This base will be a steady foundation for them as adults.
Now...where did I put those oyster crackers????
obsessed!
ReplyDelete