Tag: bishop

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Bishop Robert Barron

Dipped in the Holy Spirit and set on fire

Revealing one of the most significant themes in Catholic theology, namely, the play between nature and grace, St. Luke tells us that people came to John the Baptist, asking what they should do to reform their lives. John responds with good and very pointed moral advice.

To the tax collectors he says, “Don’t take more money than you ought” and to the soldiers he urges, “Do not practice extortion, do not falsely accuse anyone; be content with your pay.”

In so saying, he was addressing very common practices of that time and place. Tax collectors regularly demanded more money than was just and skimmed the surplus for themselves — which helps to explain why they were so unpopular. And soldiers — young men with weapons and too much time on their hands — predictably acted as bully-boys, extorting money through threats of violence.

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Tony Magliano

Jerusalem Bishop gives insights on peacemaking

Recently I emailed questions to the auxiliary bishop of the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, Bishop William Shomali, asking him to share his first-hand insights regarding the many injustices and violent environment in the land of the Prince of Peace. He sent back a recorded audio response upon which this column is based.

Bishop Shomali said one of the most pressing problems facing Palestinians is Israeli-imposed restrictions on movement. For example, he said Palestinians living in Bethlehem or Ramallah need to obtain a permit to go just six miles to Jerusalem. And permits are only given during principle feasts. He said the ongoing illegal building of Israeli settlements on Palestinian land in the Occupied Territories is an extremely serious roadblock to a peaceful solution.

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Bishop Robert Barron

A report from ‘Baby Bishop School’

For the past week, I have been sequestered at the Ateneo Pontificio Regina Apostolorum in Rome, an institution about five miles west of St. Peter’s Basilica.

I’m here for the Formation for New Bishops’ program, more colloquially known as “Baby Bishop School.” My colleagues are about 150 other bishops from around the world who have been appointed in the last 12 months.

The accommodations are fairly spartan: my room reminds me of my quarters in the college seminary, the bed is about two and a half feet wide, and there is no air conditioning. The meals, however, are tasty, and the conversations even tastier.

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Bishop Robert Barron

Christian apologists, wake up! (part two)

Second in a two-part series on a Pew Study about why young people are leaving the active practice of Christianity. Part one looked at, first, the relationship between religion and science and, second, the dismissive “psychologizing” of beliefs. In this second part, Bishop Barron examines two more reasons young people offered in the study for “walking away from Christianity.” His analysis of the source of the problem, included in part one, is reprinted here in the first two paragraphs.

For the past 50 years or so, Christian thinkers have largely abandoned the art of apologetics and have failed (here I offer a j’accuse to many in the Catholic universities) to resource the riches of the Catholic intellectual tradition in order to hold off critics of the faith. I don’t blame the avatars of secularism for actively attempting to debunk Christianity; that’s their job, after all.

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Bishop Robert Barron

Theologians and catechists: wake up!

First in a two-part series on a Pew Study about why young people are leaving the active practice of Christianity.

After perusing the latest Pew Study on why young people are leaving the active practice of Christianity, I confess that I just sighed in exasperation. I don’t doubt for a moment the sincerity of those who responded to the survey, but the reasons they offer for abandoning Christianity are just so uncompelling.

That is to say, any theologian, apologist, or evangelist worth his salt should be able easily to answer them. And this led me (hence the sigh) to the conclusion that “we have met the enemy and it is us.”

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Bishop Robert Barron

Advice to students, new and old

Last week I offered some remarks at the matriculation ceremony for Thomas Aquinas College in California. Since I would give the same advice to any Catholic students reentering the school year, I thought I would share my thoughts here.

A few months before I was named bishop, I gave another lecture at Thomas Aquinas College. I was asked to deliver a talk that I thought was going to be a little too heavy. It was late at night, I had flown in from Chicago and driven up the California highway, and I thought, “Oh, this talk is going to bomb.”

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Bishop Robert Barron

Ben-Hur: a tale of Christ, a tale of grace

Lew Wallace’s 19th century novel, Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, inspired two silent movies in the early decades of the 20th century and the magnificent 1959 film starring Charlton Heston in the lead role.

Almost everyone agrees that Heston was born to play the part, and who can forget the drama and excitement of the chariot race with which the movie comes to its climax?

Roma Downey and Mark Burnett have produced a new instantiation of the story, a streamlined version of the 1959 film. Like its predecessor, this one features a charismatic actor (Jack Huston) as Ben-Hur, plenty of visual grandeur, and yes, a stunning chariot race, depicted this time with the most up to date camera technology and CGI virtuosity.

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Bishop Robert Barron

World Youth Day 2016: Source of hope

When I arrived in Kraków for the 2016 World Youth Day, I was pretty exhausted, having left Los Angeles some 15 hours earlier and having had to change planes in Munich.

But I was enthused as I approached my first appointment right in the heart of the Old City. Through the good ministrations of George Weigel, the world’s leading expert on John Paul II, I was one of a group of bishops and priests invited to spend time with the original youth group of Fr. Karol Wojtyła.

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Bishop Robert Barron

Vikings is religiously interesting show

At the prompting of some of my younger colleagues at Word on Fire, I spent time during a recent vacation getting caught up on the History Channel show Vikings.

My friends had told me that Vikings, curiously, is the most religious show on television. They were right.

Don’t get me wrong. There is enough violence, pillaging, plundering, sword-fighting, and political intrigue to satisfy the most macho viewers; but Vikings is also drenched with religion — and for that I applaud Michael Hirst, its sole writer and director.

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Bishop Robert Barron

The cross of Jesus: God’s awful work of love

I would like to continue reflecting on Fleming Rutledge’s extraordinary book The Crucifixion, which I consider one of the most insightful theological books of the decade.

In a previous article, I drew attention to Rutledge’s bracing insistence on the awfulness and shame of the crucifixion. In the ancient world, there was no punishment more painful, terrifying, and de-humanizing than the cross.

It is not simply that Jesus died or even that he was put to death by corrupt people; it was that he endured the death reserved only for the lowest and most despised.

In the light of the resurrection, the first Christians looked back on this horrific event and saw in it something commensurate with the weight of sin. Somehow, on that instrument of torture and humiliation, the Son of God was addressing what could not be adequately addressed in any other way; he was paying the requisite price.

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