Welcome back to the Word on Fire Show. I'm Brandon Vaat, the host and the content director

here at Word on Fire Catholic Ministries. We're getting near the Christmas season. We're

right here in the middle of Advent and I'm joined by Bishop Robert Barron. Bishop

Barron, good to see you. Hey, Brandon. Always a great pleasure to be on with you.

Now, I mentioned at the last episode that you had just returned from this big gathering

of US Catholic bishops in Baltimore. We didn't get a chance to talk about that, so maybe

give us an update. How'd that go for you? It's good. It's a, they're important meetings.

We cover a lot of ground. In recent years, of course, the sex abuse scandals have always

been, you know, at the center of our preoccupation, how to deal with that institutionally.

This year, I had the opportunity to address all the bishops on this famous issue that you

and I have talked about many, many times of the unaffiliated, the young people, especially

leaving the church. So that, to me, was kind of a highlight and the fact that so many

bishops responded to that presentation, of course, you were part of it too. I took a lot

of encouragement from that. What I like best about those meetings is the chance just

to get together with the brothers. So we bishops do meet together quite frequently and I think

that's good for us and good for the church. Anyway, for me, it was the end of a very long

period of obligations and speeches and trips. This fall was exceptionally busy and that

was kind of the last stop. So I was kind of happy to come home and, you know, unwind a

little bit.

What the previous bishops meeting, you gave an overview of what your committee on evangelization

and catechesis had accomplished. And it was supposed to be sort of a very short presentation

10, 15 minutes. But then during the Q&A session, all the bishops were lining up and asking

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