This is Cardinal Francis George. I invite you to join me for the next two minutes to reflect

with Father Robert Barron on the Word of God, which is the Word on Fire. Word on Fire Catholic

Ministries is a non-profit ministry at the forefront of Catholic evangelization, using

new media to spread the faith and every continent. Father Barron challenges us to open our hearts

to the Word on Fire, which is God's Word of Love for each of us. If our hearts are open,

the Lord can change and transform us so that we might speak with love about the one who

is love. The global benefactors of Word on Fire with the support of the Archdiocese of

Chicago now present Word on Fire. Peace be with you. Francis, what was it like to be in the

same room with Jesus? St. Mark was the author of the first gospel, and we're reading from

his gospel all during this liturgical cycle. St. Mark is particularly good, I think, at

communicating something of the excitement, the awe, and in some cases, the sheer weirdness of

being in the presence of the Son of God. I mean, if Jesus was who we say he was, it must have

been just something extremely different to be with him. Against all attempts in our contemporary

times to domesticate Jesus, to turn him into just one more teacher among many, I would hold up

all the gospels, but especially the gospel of Mark. The scene, which is our gospel for today,

is from the opening chapter of Mark, and it gives us, I think, maybe more than any other this

sense of how overwhelming, awe-inspiring, strange it was to be with Jesus. Notice something

first, everything in Mark is fast. The word immediately appears over and over again in his gospel.

Nothing's happening slowly. It's not really a meditative gospel. It's an action gospel. Jesus

immediately enters the synagogue and taught. He immediately goes to the house of Simon and

heals his mother-in-law. He immediately leaves and preaches to the crowd. He's a man on a mission

throughout Mark's gospel. He moves through his public life. GK Chesterton said like a lightning bolt.

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