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, we come now to the second Sunday of Lent and we're on I call it both

dangerous and very holy ground because the church is giving us this reading from

the 22nd chapter of Genesis,

the ancient Israelites referred to it as the Akeda,

which means the binding.

It's the binding of Isaac.

So he wasn't sacrificed,

but Abraham was ready to sacrifice him.

It's hard to imagine another text in the Old Testament that's more controversial,

that's stirred up more puzzlement and opposition.

And I'm with Soren Kirkegar, the great philosopher, who writes a book called Fear and Trembling

based upon this text.

His point was if you don't experience fear and trembling,

having read this text, you have not been paying attention. If you read this in a

kind of simplistic moralizing way or you pass it

pass it over because you've heard it a thousand times

you're not coming to grips with it.

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