Bishop Barron’s Sunday Sermons - Catholic Preaching and Homilies

Today's readings show that one can and should stand before God, individually, and assume spiritual responsibility. That responsibility is not collective but personal. It confronts each of us with the question, “Where I do stand in response to God's invitation?"

The Bible constantly warns against a merely mercenary relationship with God—a friendship of convenience or self-interest. We should not love God simply because doing so will produce many consolations in our life. We must enter a true relationship, where we fall in love not with his benefits, but with him.

When we live in convenient darkness, unaware of our sins, we will never make spiritual progress. We need the light, however painful it is. Once that light reveals to us our sin and dysfunction, then we can rise. That's what we discover on the cross of Jesus. We meet our own sin, and we also meet the merciful savior, who has taken that sin upon himself in order to swallow it up.

Should we address someone who is in the wrong? This week's Gospel cautions against gossip and malicious criticism, but it also explains how to frtuifully correct someone and bring them to the truth.