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, the first reading for this weekend and the gospel,

which are meant to be read and tandem. Our very good examples of what I've

called principles of spiritual physics. What I mean is they lay out some

ideas and relationships that are fundamental to the spiritual order. Laws if

you want. You know, often when it sounds like punishment or threats, what's

being discussed are these laws. You know, you could say, oh that guy's

threatening me if I drive my car off the cliff, it's gonna crash. Well,

not really a threat, he's just laying out the laws of physics. So there's

spiritual laws to that obtain in a similar way. Well, both readings have a

good deal to say about riches. So in the first reading, Solomon, who is the

archetype of the wise man, and this is of course taken from the book of wisdom

appropriately. Here's what he said, I pleaded and a spirit of wisdom came to me.

I preferred her to scepter and throne and deemed riches nothing in comparison

to her. Nor did I like in any price, price list gem to her because all gold and

view of her is a little sand. That's a wonderful little move going on there.

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