Become Someone for Others

Bishop Barron’s Sunday Sermons - Catholic Preaching and Homilies

Bishop Robert Barron

Spirituality, Christianity, Religion & Spirituality, Religion & Spirituality:christianity

4.8 • 4.9K Ratings

🗓️ 6 February 2026

⏱️ 15 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Friends, a great professor of mine at Mundelein Seminary, Dr. Richard Issel, once said, “If you want to be happy, stop worrying about being happy and get on with becoming fulfilled.” We find something similar in Jordan Peterson’s observation that “self-consciousness is equivalent to misery.” In short, we’re most unhappy when we’re turned inward, fussing about ourselves. If you want to be psychologically healthy, forget about yourself and move out toward others. I always think of this when I come across our Gospel for today from the great Sermon on the Mount.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Friends, welcome to Word on Fire Catholic Ministries.
0:04.0	Word on Fire is an apostolate dedicated to the mission of evangelization,
0:09.0	using media both old and new to share the faith on every continent
0:14.0	and to facilitate an encounter with Christ and His Church.
0:18.0	The efforts of Word on Fire engage the culture and bring the transformative power of God's
0:24.7	word where it is most needed.
0:27.2	Today, we invite you to join Bishop Robert Barron as he preaches the gospel and shares the
0:33.0	warmth and light of Christ with each one of us.
0:40.6	Peace be with you.
0:41.7	Friends, many years ago when I was a student at Munderlande Seminary, we had a great professor
0:46.1	named Dr. Richard Issel.
0:47.9	He was a psychologist and he taught these courses in counseling and one was called, I remember,
0:53.0	the psychology of successful parish priesthood.
0:56.2	Well, I took all of his courses. He was a great teacher. And one principle I remember from
1:01.3	Issel is this. He said, if you want to be happy, stop worrying about being happy and get on
1:09.9	with becoming fulfilled.
1:12.6	Happiness, and Aristotle knew this too, a long time before Dr. Issel,
1:17.6	happiness is a kind of byproduct of fulfillment.
1:21.6	The worst thing you do is to turn inward and fuss about why am I not happy?
1:25.6	How do I become happy?
1:26.6	Forget about being happy.
1:28.6	Become fulfilled and the happiness will take care of itself. Something similar I found in
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