Colbert Returns With Tribute to Late Mom

Stephen Colbert took an unexpected hiatus after his mother died last week, but last night he was back on the Colbert Report—and he opened the show with a sure-to-make-you-teary tribute to his mom, Lorna. Anyone who likes Colbert has his mom to thank, he explained before launching into a history of her life and what it was like to be one of her 11 children. "I know it may sound greedy to want more days with a person who lived so long, but the fact that my mother was 92 does not diminish, it only magnifies the enormity of the room whose doors have quietly shut," he said.

He explained that toward the end, his mother was often getting confused, but still remembered the prayer she used to tuck in her children as a young mom. "We were the light of her life, and she let us know it ‘til the end," he said. "Now we can get to the truly important work of television broadcasting, which is what she would want me to do. When I was leaving her last week, I leaned over and I said, 'Mom, I’m going back to New York to do the show,' and she said 'I can’t wait to see it. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.' So, with that in mind … this is the Colbert Report." (More Stephen Colbert stories.)