Friends, welcome to Word on Fire Catholic Ministries. Word on Fire is an

apostolate dedicated to the mission of evangelization using media both old and

new to share the faith on every continent and to facilitate an encounter with

Christ and His Church. The efforts of Word on Fire engage the culture and bring

the transformative power of God's Word where it is most needed. Today we invite

you to join Bishop Robert Barron as he preaches the gospel and shares the

warmth and light of Christ with each one of us. Peace be with you. Friends, our

gospel today is from Matthew chapter 15, the famous story of Jesus and the

zero Phoenician woman. Now I found my years of preaching. This is one of those

gospels that bothers people. They come up to you afterwards and even after your

homily, which you think is cleared up every question, they still say, look, I

don't get it. This gospel unnerves me. You know, the story where Jesus is up

now in this region of tire and sight and so it would be just outside of the

borders of Israel and he comes across this Canaanite woman and she cries out to

him, have pity on me. Lord son of David, my daughter is tormented by a demon.

Now normally Jesus, you know, okay, I will act. I will do something. He responds.

Well, this one, there's such a sort of off-putting quality, right? So Jesus

first did not say a word and answer to her. Now can you imagine, you know, someone

comes up to you and asks a favor and you don't even say, I'm sorry or I can't do

it right now. You don't even say a word to her. And then the disciples come. So

Jesus entourage. They kind of get on her case and they, they, you know, asked to

send her away. And she keeps persisting and Jesus says, no, no, I've, I've been

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