Bishop Barron’s Sunday Sermons - Catholic Preaching and Homilies
Episodes
Zechariah and the New David
01 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Our first reading for this weekend is derived from the ninth chapter of the book of the prophet Zechariah, one of the twelve so-called minor prophets ...
Elisha and the Shunemite Woman
24 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Our first reading for this weekend is taken from the marvelous second book of Kings, and it deals with the prophet Elisha, who was the chosen successo...
Carrying the Word of God
17 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Today I have the special pleasure of preaching on a passage from the prophet Jeremiah, someone that we hear from relatively rarely throughout the litu...
Supersubstantial Bread
10 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
This is the first celebration of Corpus Christi—the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ—after the Pew Forum study showing that 70% of Cathol...
The Strange Doctrine of the Trinity
03 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Today we come to the wonderful Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. The Trinity: the strangest and most distinctive of all of the doctrines of Christia...
The Birthday of the Church: One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic
27 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
On this great feast of Pentecost, I would like to say “happy birthday” to every Catholic listening to me, for we hold, in our traditional theology...
The Ascension of the Lord
20 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
We come today to the great Feast of the Ascension of the Lord, which sheds so much light on who we are as Christians and what we are supposed to be ab...
Give a Reason for the Hope That Is in You
13 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For this sixth Sunday of Easter, I would like to continue with the first letter of St. Peter, which is our second reading for this weekend. Peter say...
An Icon of the Church
06 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For this fifth Sunday of the Easter season, I should like to return to our consideration of the Acts of the Apostles. Our passage for today is taken f...
Suffering for Doing Good
29 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For this fourth Sunday of Easter, I would like to concentrate on our second reading, which is from the first letter of Peter, a beautiful text that we...
Emmaus and Genesis
21 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
It is my privilege this third Sunday of Easter to preach on one of the most magnificent texts in the New Testament, a masterpiece within the masterpie...
Three Tasks of the Church
15 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
All throughout the Easter season, we will read at Mass from the wonderful Acts of the Apostles, St. Luke’s description of the adventures, challenges...
God's Great Yes to Humanity
08 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Easter Sunday represents God’s great yes to humanity. Throughout history, humanity has turned its back on God, but the Lord has constantly sent resc...
Into the Cacophony of Sin
01 Apr 2020
Contributed by Lukas
On Palm Sunday, we are privileged to listen to one of the great Passion narratives. In Matthew’s account, we see Jesus as a still-point in the maels...
Let Him Go
25 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The great Lenten readings for Cycle A move in a kind of crescendo from thirst, to blindness, to death—all metaphors for spiritual dysfunction. This...
A Man After God’s Own Heart
18 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Our first reading for this weekend gives us a glimpse of one of the most powerful texts in the Bible—indeed, one of the truly great literary works t...
By the Waters of Meribah
11 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Our first reading for today is the famous quarreling of Israel by the waters of Meribah in the book of Exodus. We find the chosen people in the midst ...
Listening to a Higher Voice
04 Mar 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Last week, we looked at the familiar material from the third chapter of Genesis. God’s human creatures fell, precisely in the measure that they sto...
The Disobedience of Adam and Eve
26 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
We enter once more into the very holy season of Lent: a time of preparation; a desert time; a time of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving; a time to retur...
Be Holy
19 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
As we continue our focus on the Old Testament texts, we turn this week to the nineteenth chapter of the book of Leviticus. As the name suggests, the ...
Choosing to Keep the Commandments
12 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Our first reading for this weekend is taken from a book that we don’t consult that frequently in the course of the liturgical year—namely, the boo...
Love as a Panacea
05 Feb 2020
Contributed by Lukas
I would like to concentrate on the marvelous passage from chapter 58 of the prophet Isaiah, which is our first reading for this weekend. This final se...
The Lord Returns to His Temple
29 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
There is a tendency, I’m afraid, to flatten out and sentimentalize the meaning of the Presentation of the Lord in the Temple. We see it as just a ch...
In the Land of Zebulon and Naphtali
22 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Our first reading from the prophet Isaiah and our Gospel are tightly linked, for St. Matthew, in articulating the meaning of Jesus, cites (as is his w...
Knowing Who We Are
15 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The entirety of this Sunday’s second reading might be seen as so much boilerplate, throwaway lines that a writer used at the commencement of his let...
It Is Too Little for You to Be My Servant
15 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
I want to focus this week on the extraordinary passage from the book of the prophet Isaiah, for it reveals a central dynamic of all of biblical revela...
Vitae Spiritualis Ianua
08 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The first sacrament one can receive in the Church, Baptism, defines our relationship with Christ. In it, we are reborn as part of his Mystical Body an...
The Light of the Nations
03 Jan 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Today’s readings for Epiphany speak of a light that shines on Israel, the chosen people, but that is meant for the whole world, a light that is a be...
Herod and Joseph
25 Dec 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The point of our Gospel for Holy Family Sunday is to make us see a contrast between Herod, the perfect type of the anti-family man, and Joseph, the se...
Dream Big
18 Dec 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The Bible turns upside-down the way we think about the God-human relationship. In almost every other religion or philosophy, God or the gods are the p...
What You Hear and See
11 Dec 2019
Contributed by Lukas
On this third Sunday of Advent, we hear for the first time this season of the great figure of John the Baptist. It’s not really possible to understa...
The Messiah’s Work
04 Dec 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Last week, I spoke of preparing for the coming of the Lord using the great image from the second chapter of Isaiah: the Lord’s holy mountain. How do...
Getting the House in Order
27 Nov 2019
Contributed by Lukas
We come once again to Advent, the beginning of the liturgical year and the great season of waiting. Christian life has a permanent Advent quality, for...
March in the Army of the True King
20 Nov 2019
Contributed by Lukas
It is extraordinarily significant that the liturgical year ends with the feast of Christ the King. For this great fact—that Jesus Christ is the king...
A Theology of Work
13 Nov 2019
Contributed by Lukas
I’m pretty sure that in thirty years of priesthood, I’ve never preached on this Sunday’s short second reading from Paul’s second letter to the...
The Martyrs and a Higher World
06 Nov 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The story conveyed in our first reading from the second book of Maccabees is one that resonates up and down the ages, that still stirs our hearts toda...
The Love of Predilection
30 Oct 2019
Contributed by Lukas
In Luke’s Gospel we read the story of Jesus and Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus, as chief tax collector, was considered a very bad man in first-century Israel,...
Paul at the End of the Race
23 Oct 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Our gorgeous and deeply moving second reading this week is taken from Paul’s second letter to Timothy. I wonder whether I might invite especially th...
Persistence in Prayer
16 Oct 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The Bible and the great Tradition are massively interested in prayer, especially the prayer of petition. There are many types of prayer—meditation, ...
The Path to Healing Is a Humble Path
09 Oct 2019
Contributed by Lukas
I have always loved the story of Naaman the Syrian, which is found in the second book of Kings, as part of the Elisha cycle of readings. It is, on the...
Faith the Size of a Mustard Seed
02 Oct 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Last week, I plunged for the second time into the world of the Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything). I can’t tell you how many participants in the AMA posed...
Don’t Forget the Poor
25 Sep 2019
Contributed by Lukas
When the conclave of 2013 was finishing up, and Jorge Mario Bergoglio was elected pope, Cardinal Hummes of Brazil came up to him and whispered into hi...
Yes and No to Power
18 Sep 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Our first and second readings for this weekend beautifully sum up the Church’s classical attitude toward those in power. I’ve long argued that the...
A Coin, A Sheep, A Son
11 Sep 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Our Gospel for today gives us three classic parables, each one exploring the notion that is at the very heart of the spiritual life—namely, that God...
The Cost of Discipleship
04 Sep 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Our Gospel for today is breathtaking, first for what it says about Jesus and second for what it says about us. Jesus compels a choice the way no othe...
Ignatian Detachment
28 Aug 2019
Contributed by Lukas
It was a particular joy for me to visit the sites associated with St. Ignatius of Loyola on a recent film trip. But the most moving locale was a littl...
The Narrow Gate
21 Aug 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The topic of the Gospel for today—the question of how many will be saved—stirs up such passionate feelings in people, and there is such enormous d...
Fate of the Prophet
14 Aug 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Our readings for today develop a theme that is uncomfortable. Authentically religious people, authentically spiritual people, will almost always be op...
Fate of the Prophet
14 Aug 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Our readings for today develop a theme that is uncomfortable. Authentically religious people, authentically spiritual people, will almost always be op...
The Hero’s Journey
07 Aug 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The Jungian psychologist Jordan Peterson is, in many ways, an early twenty-first century version of Joseph Campbell, and perhaps the central archetype...
Bigger Barns or Treasure in Heaven?
31 Jul 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The readings for this weekend have a tremendous cohesiveness. They all speak to a truth about our world that is hard to take in, that has to be repeat...
Abba Father, Bring us Jesus
24 Jul 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The Our Father, the Lord’s Prayer, is a request for Christ. As we examine this most famous prayer line by line, we see it's all about Jesus. That ...
Martha, Mary, and the Attitude of Discipleship
17 Jul 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Although the little story of Martha and Mary has been interpreted throughout the centuries as a parable dealing with the “active” and “contempla...
HEARING THE VOICE OF GOD
10 Jul 2019
Contributed by Lukas
During the twentieth century, moral relativism was in vogue in elite cultural circles, but now it is the dominant moral outlook of the broader culture...
Boasting in the Cross
03 Jul 2019
Contributed by Lukas
St. Paul tells us in our second reading that he boasts in the cross of Jesus. To any of his hearers in the first century this would have sounded like ...
Walking Truly and Completely with Him
26 Jun 2019
Contributed by Lukas
In the Gospel for this Sunday, Jesus clarifies that all worldly goods find their value in relation to Him. If we believe Jesus is the only Son of God,...
Corpus Christi
19 Jun 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The Church comes from the Eucharist for it is the sacrifice that makes saints. The Eucharist is essentially the fullest act of gratitude prefigured in...
Begotten Not Made
14 Jun 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Today the Church celebrates the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. The Nicene Creed articulates the mystery of the Trinity with the wonderful phrase ...
The Holy Spirit and Mission
14 Jun 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Today we celebrate the great feast of Pentecost, one of the truly great moments in the life of the Church. The Holy Spirit comes to give many spiritua...
The Ascension of Jesus
14 Jun 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Too often we read the Ascension as the moment when Jesus “went away,” when he left us on our own and went off to heaven, where we hope some day t...
The Spirit and the Bride Say, “Come”
29 May 2019
Contributed by Lukas
On this seventh and final Sunday of the Easter season, I want to bring to a close my meditation on the extraordinary book of Revelation. With the disc...
The Great Story Comes to an End
22 May 2019
Contributed by Lukas
On this sixth Sunday of Easter, we are coming to the end of the book of Revelation, the final book of the Bible. We are approaching, in a word, the cl...
The New Jerusalem
15 May 2019
Contributed by Lukas
We are coming now toward the end of the book of Revelation, which means toward the end of the entire Biblical story. Writers will often draw the begin...
The Imperialism of the Martyrs
08 May 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The book of Revelation is an unveiling of a new state of affairs, the new things that are on offer in light of Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. Th...
Heavenly Praise
01 May 2019
Contributed by Lukas
In today’s reading from Revelation, John is in the heavenly court and he sees angels, elders, and living creatures, countless in number, all standin...
Apokalypsis
24 Apr 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The Church has placed the book of Revelation at the end of the Bible, as the culmination of the entire Biblical narrative—precisely because it has r...
Three Easter Lessons
19 Apr 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The resurrection of Jesus from the dead is the foundation of the entire Christian faith. If Jesus didn’t rise from the dead, we should all go home a...
The Master Has Need of You
11 Apr 2019
Contributed by Lukas
In our Gospel reading for the Palm Sunday procession, Jesus sends his disciples into Jerusalem to prepare for his triumphal entry. They are told to un...
Misery and Mercy
03 Apr 2019
Contributed by Lukas
In this week's Gospel, we hear the story of the woman caught in adultery, a tale that has beguiled Christians and non-Christians for two millennia. Th...
Theonomy
27 Mar 2019
Contributed by Lukas
One the greatest Protestant theologians of the twentieth century, Paul Tillich, made a distinction between heteronomy (law from another), autonomy (la...
Why the Burning Bush is Such Good News
21 Mar 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The Glorified Body
13 Mar 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The readings for this second Sunday of Lent awaken a sense of wonder, of a world beyond ours, a mystical consciousness. In the first reading with Abr...
Three Questions from the Desert
06 Mar 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Lent is a time of paring down—a time spent in the desert, if you will—as exemplified by Jesus’ forty days of fasting in these arid, barren land...
The Danger of Blind Guides
27 Feb 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Our Gospel for this weekend comes from the end of the Sermon on the Plain, which is St. Luke’s version, more or less, of the Sermon on the Mount in ...
Grace and the Aporia of the Gift
20 Feb 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The philosopher Jacques Derrida reflected on what he called the aporia or dilemma of the gift. The upshot seems to be that it is virtually impossible ...
A Salt and Empty Earth
13 Feb 2019
Contributed by Lukas
I would like to focus on the brief but extremely powerful passage from the book of the prophet Jeremiah, which is our first reading for this weekend. ...
Invasion of Grace, Confession of Sin, Acceptance of Mission
06 Feb 2019
Contributed by Lukas
There is a wonderful parallel between our first reading and the Gospel this week. The first reading is taken from the sixth chapter of the book of the...
The Primacy of Love
30 Jan 2019
Contributed by Lukas
This week we hear from St. Paul’s brilliant meditation on love. Everything in religion and theology revolves around love. It is at the heart of ever...
Learning Who We Are
24 Jan 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The dramatic scene presented in the Book of Nehemiah presents a people who had forgotten their identity and learned, as if for the first time, who the...
The First of Signs
16 Jan 2019
Contributed by Lukas
The communion of humanity and divinity in Christ’s divine person can be likened to a marriage. Sin effects a kind of divorce between God and humanit...
Following the Star
02 Jan 2019
Contributed by Lukas
Our modern culture suggests a tension between spirituality and religion. But the Magi in today’s Gospel demonstrate that when spirituality is lifted...
Hannah, Her Son, and the Holy Family
26 Dec 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Lots of people today will tell you what makes a family well-adjusted, functional, and peaceful. But in this week’s readings for the Feast of the Ho...
A New David
19 Dec 2018
Contributed by Lukas
The New Testament authors consistently reached to the Old Testament for their categories of understanding. Hence, Jesus is the Torah in person; the n...
Rejoice Always!
12 Dec 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Like most of the prophets, Zephaniah trades in a fair amount of doom and gloom—but he also dreams of the great day of victory and vindication. The ...
Mountains and Valleys
05 Dec 2018
Contributed by Lukas
In our Gospel for today, Luke invokes the most significant cultural and political players of that time and place; but then, just as he did in the Chr...
A New Fixed Star
28 Nov 2018
Contributed by Lukas
This Sunday is New Year’s Day, in the liturgical sense of the term. With the first Sunday of Advent, we commence the liturgical year of 2019. And Ne...
What Does It Mean to Say that Christ Is King?
21 Nov 2018
Contributed by Lukas
The liturgical year ends with the feast of Christ the King. This day reminds us what the Christian thing is all about: that Jesus really is the king, ...
Daniel and the New Kingdom
15 Nov 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Our first reading for this weekend is from the utterly fascinating book of Daniel. Daniel is an example of apocalyptic literature, and apocalyptic bo...
A Tale of Two Widows
07 Nov 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Today’s Scriptures highlight two widows and two very important biblical principles: God reveals himself precisely at that moment of our greatest vul...
Hear, O Israel
31 Oct 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Our first reading for Mass this week contains the defining prayer of the Jewish tradition: the “Sh’ma.” In the Gospel, when asked which comman...
Coming Home from Exile
24 Oct 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Our first reading from the prophet Jeremiah treats of a theme that is basic throughout the Bible: the motif of the return from exile. Like two great h...
Substitutionary Sacrifice
17 Oct 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Friends, all three readings for this weekend center around a theme that was very familiar to the ancient audiences who first took them in but that is ...
Riches and Wisdom
10 Oct 2018
Contributed by Lukas
The first reading for this weekend and the Gospel, which are meant to be read in tandem, are very good examples of what I’ve called principles of sp...
The Biblical View of Marriage
03 Oct 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Our first reading for this weekend is of pivotal significance in the Bible, for it lays out some of the fundamentals of human anthropology and the Chr...
Would That Everyone Could Be a Prophet
26 Sep 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Our first reading from the Book of Numbers and the Gospel reading from Mark both highlight a very interesting spiritual predicament, one that is prese...
The Undoing of Original Sin
26 Sep 2018
Contributed by Lukas
One of the most important doctrines of the Church is the doctrine of original sin, which asserts that something it off with us. We see the effects of ...
Faith Perfected by Love
12 Sep 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Today's second reading from the letter of James discusses the relationship between faith and love. We need a strong faith, but faith without love is l...
Ephphatha
05 Sep 2018
Contributed by Lukas
In this week's Gospel, Jesus heals a man who is deaf and dumb. When we read this account at the spiritual level, we see that he cures those who are de...
Laws and Laws
29 Aug 2018
Contributed by Lukas
All of today's readings pertain to law. We Americans are a fairly litigious society. Lawyers are thick on the ground and many of our Founding Fathers ...
Wisdom's Meal
15 Aug 2018
Contributed by Lukas
Today's first reading personifies Wisdom as a woman who invites people to a feast, lavishly offering food and wine. In today's Psalm, we echo that inv...