Good morning, this is Cardinal Francis George, and I invite you to join me for the next few minutes to reflect with Father Robert Baron on the Word of God, which is the Word on Fire.

Father Baron will challenge 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, who we might speak with love about the one who is love.

The Archdiocese of Chicago through the generosity of Sacred Heart Parishing Winnetka now presents the Word on Fire.

Peace be with you.

Friends, today I want to talk to you about prayer.

Now prayer is something that most of us do on a daily basis, perhaps.

But prayer is also a very puzzling phenomenon.

And in my pastoral experience, I found that prayer is often a source of great frustration for people.

You know, I pray and I pray and I pray, but things don't seem to happen the way I want them to happen.

Now our readings are very provocative.

The first reading and the gospel are both about prayer in different ways, and they make very strong claims about it.

The first reading is that well-known passage from the book of Genesis.

We're reading, of course, these stories of Abraham the last several weeks.

Where Abraham literally dickers with God.

Remember God says he's going to destroy Sodom because of its terrible sins.

And Abraham confronts him.

And then just like a merchant, he begins to dicker with God as we're bringing the price down.

If you found 50 righteous people in Sodom, would you destroy it?

And God says, no, for the sake of the 50, I wouldn't.

Well, how about 45?

No, for the 45, I wouldn't destroy it.

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