Last week when I ranted about Black Friday and the absurd over-commercialization of Christmas, I wrote:
“The littlest kids are getting gifts (small ones; hello chess sets!) — and everyone else is getting homemade cookies or Monastic soaps, cremes and candies — high-quality “things” that are quickly used and gone, and whose purchase helps sustain houses of prayer — or books that can actually change people’s lives by helping them to find a measure of true comfort and joy, those two genuine gifts of Christmas.”
I’m making good on that, today, and as George Weigel has put forward a really excellent list of great gift titles (including this one, which I’d not seen and of course desperately want) I thought I’d add a few titles. Unsurprisingly, Weigel is as hot for giving people copies of Catholicism as I am, and I’ve already told you why this book is also a great gift, but here are a few more:
for a Catholic who needs to vent!
for someone who still thinks it’s a “symbol”
for a guy who is a guy and needs a guy’s way of being faithful
for someone who misses fiction about nuns (come on, we all do!)
for a deep-water diving companion
for someone who would like a gentle encounter with Truth, everyday
for a kid who likes comic books
for someone with great intentions and a short attention span
for exhausted girl who needs brain candy at night
And in DVD:
Pope John Paul II; the Man, the Pope and his Message
Okay, I’m exhausted — how about ya’ll pitch in? What books, DVD’s and kids things are you buying?
UPDATE: I just realized, I didn’t actually include a Christmas title in any of this. Here are two: the first is a Kindle single, Dakota Christmas by Joseph Bottum.
“Her hair was the same thin shade of gray as the weather-beaten pickets of the fence around her frozen garden. She had a way with horses, and she was alone on Christmas Eve. There is little in my life I regret as much as that I would not stay for just one cookie, just one cup of tea.”
And two more:
This because this is gloriously beautiful
And this — because the book is even better than the film!
UPDATE II: Webster Bull has A list of his favorite books