This is Cardinal Francis George. I invite you to join me for the next few 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. Friends, over the past several weeks,

we've been looking at a number of the remarkable parables of the Lord from the latter chapters

of the Gospel of Matthew. I might invite you if you have some time, take out your scriptures

and go to the end of the Gospel of Matthew and see this whole string of parables, wonderful,

and the church now has been immersing us in these stories the last couple of weeks. But

I want to turn from them this week and focus on the second reading, which is from St. Paul

to the Philippians. This little passage is so good and it's so worthy of our careful

spiritual attention. Again, speaking of reading the Bible, take out your New Testament and

read Paul to the Philippians. You can easily read it in one sitting. It's very brief and

it's just a marvelous letter. What's eminently clear is that Paul had a special affection

for the Philippians. After all, they were the first community that he formed in Europe.

Remember, after he had passed over from Asia Minor and he comes to Europe and at that

moment, as I've said before, a major cultural revolution takes place because that's the

introduction of European Christianity, which in turn would influence the whole world,

including the fact that I'm sitting here today as an American of Irish descent speaking

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