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, you know, the last several years I've been doing culture commentaries

and so on on YouTube, which is the most popular website in the world. I make comments on

books and movies and culture and scripture and so on. And then people can respond. So I

get a very good feel, I think, for what people outside the church are thinking and more

precisely what's blocking them in their relationship to the church. I've identified four or five major

areas. But you know, I think number one is number one problem. When you're talking to people

outside the church and trying to get them to think about religion, is the problem of

religion and violence. Now, all this has been exacerbated by the events of September 11th

when religious people, at least ostensibly religious people, perform this great act of violence.

It stirred up a very old idea, namely that religion is irrational and therefore it's violent.

If religious people disagree with each other and they can't make good arguments about their

point of view, all they can do is fight. Well, people who are influenced by this view now

go back through the Bible. And what do they find? Well, they find lots of examples of violence

in the Bible. When God seems to be commanding all sorts of terrible things, I found by the

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