# The Baby King Who Takes on Caesar - Bishop Barron's Daily Sermons

An episode of [Daily Sermons With Bishop Robert Barron](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/6783446284), 3 Aug 2026, 28 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/72733597/the_baby_king_who_takes_on_caesar.mp3



## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: Everyone's thinking about the Roman Empire today, right, that's the
[0:02] Speaker 1: thing that men think about the Roman Empire. Well, I
[0:04] Speaker 1: thought about it a lot when I was there, because
[0:06] Speaker 1: you can't miss it. Everywhere you go. They're signs the
[0:09] Speaker 1: Roman Empire. But what are they? They're ruins. It's a wreck.
[0:14] Speaker 1: It's a wreck. There's dusty ruins remain. But there I
[0:19] Speaker 1: was as a bishop of the Catholic Church, founded by
[0:25] Speaker 1: that baby, right, founded by that baby who was put
[0:30] Speaker 1: to death on a miserable cross by Caesar's representative. And
[0:35] Speaker 1: yet Caesar and his empire they are long gone. But
[0:39] Speaker 1: the baby with the angel Army one one, and that
[0:45] Speaker 1: church weirdly, weirdly endures to this day.
[0:59] Speaker 2: Welcome back to the Word on Fire show. I'm Brandon Fatt,
[1:02] Speaker 2: the host and the senior publishing director at Word on Fire.
[1:06] Speaker 2: Is the Christmas story little more than a sweet, sachering
[1:10] Speaker 2: tale about a cute baby being born? Or do the
[1:14] Speaker 2: Gospels present something more subversive and revolutionary, a battle between
[1:20] Speaker 2: two great kings. Well that's how Bishop Robert Baron reads it,
[1:24] Speaker 2: and he joins us today from our Word on Fire
[1:26] Speaker 2: studio in Rochester. Bishop, good to see you.
[1:28] Speaker 1: Again, Hey, Brandon, always good to see you.
[1:32] Speaker 2: Saw you in person about a week or two ago
[1:34] Speaker 2: because we had the big Good News Conference held every year.
[1:38] Speaker 2: This year it was back in Orlando, Florida, my hometown.
[1:40] Speaker 2: I was overjoyed to be able to help as the
[1:43] Speaker 2: MC for the conference. But tell us how it went.
[1:46] Speaker 2: You got to celebrate mass, you gave a keynote talk,
[1:49] Speaker 2: a book signing, but then I think the big highlight
[1:51] Speaker 2: was this panel discussion that you shared with Jordan Peterson
[1:55] Speaker 2: and father Mike Schmidt. So maybe recap all that for us.
[1:58] Speaker 1: Yeah, it was a throw. I always enjoyed the Good
[2:00] Speaker 1: News Conference, and they worked me this year, as you're saying,
[2:03] Speaker 1: I did a lot, but always a joy to see
[2:06] Speaker 1: all the folks there at the book signing. I gave
[2:08] Speaker 1: a keynote after dinner, and I forgot what night that was,
[2:11] Speaker 1: but that was a great joy. And you know, I
[2:15] Speaker 1: hearing Immaculae Iligabiza for the first time. I'd read her
[2:19] Speaker 1: book many years ago. I've read about her and so on,
[2:23] Speaker 1: but it was my first chance to meet her, and
[2:24] Speaker 1: I with great interest set you know through her talk,
[2:28] Speaker 1: So that was a that was a privilege. And then yeah,
[2:30] Speaker 1: the on stage discussion with Father Mike and with Jordan
[2:34] Speaker 1: Peterson was was great as much as you expect, you
[2:36] Speaker 1: know Peterson. It was a kind of a brainy, heady
[2:41] Speaker 1: high wire act, you know with him, but he was good.
[2:44] Speaker 1: He engaged, you know, the two of us and our
[2:47] Speaker 1: own Matt Patruzick was the host for that, the man
[2:50] Speaker 1: kind of keeping it together, and it went by pretty fast.
[2:53] Speaker 1: I mean we're it was what hour and fifteen hour
[2:55] Speaker 1: and twenty minutes because Jordan, God bless him, came in
[2:59] Speaker 1: and he did that event and then he had to
[3:01] Speaker 1: go right back to the airport, and so we cut
[3:03] Speaker 1: it off at about an hour and twenty minutes. But
[3:05] Speaker 1: hopefully that'll come out at some point.
[3:07] Speaker 3: Huh.
[3:08] Speaker 1: Well, have a chance to publish that, but.
[3:10] Speaker 2: It was it was a joint recorded the video, so
[3:12] Speaker 2: I hope we'll be able to release it soon.
[3:14] Speaker 1: Yeah.
[3:14] Speaker 2: I was laughing because I think we had scheduled that
[3:17] Speaker 2: panel discussion for an hour, which in retrospect was probably
[3:20] Speaker 2: about one tenth as long as it needed to be,
[3:23] Speaker 2: and as the MC would, we let it go for
[3:26] Speaker 2: like an hour and twenty minutes, and then I came
[3:27] Speaker 2: out on stage kind of to try to wrap it up.
[3:30] Speaker 2: And as soon as people saw the MC come out,
[3:32] Speaker 2: they started booing. This is the first Catholic conference when
[3:36] Speaker 2: somebody got booed. But it was because the discussion was
[3:38] Speaker 2: so lively they didn't want it to end.
[3:40] Speaker 3: Well.
[3:40] Speaker 1: Great thing about you know Peterson is he he thinks
[3:43] Speaker 1: on the fly. You know, he's not just giving canned answers.
[3:45] Speaker 1: And it wasn't like just you know, one, two, three,
[3:48] Speaker 1: But he would engage the two of us like I
[3:51] Speaker 1: would say something and he'd well, I want to follow
[3:53] Speaker 1: up on that, and so it made the conversation lively.
[3:58] Speaker 2: Well again, hopefully we'll be able to least that video
[4:00] Speaker 2: sometime pretty soon. All right, Bishop, Well, this episode is
[4:04] Speaker 2: releasing just before Christmas, and with Christmas around the corner,
[4:08] Speaker 2: I thought it was a good chance to take a
[4:10] Speaker 2: fresh look at the story of the birth of Jesus,
[4:13] Speaker 2: which of course all Christians will hear proclaimed on Christmas.
[4:17] Speaker 2: Let's begin with this. You've said before that the infancy
[4:20] Speaker 2: narratives are not cloying, sentimental kid stories, but if you
[4:26] Speaker 2: understand the literary genre techniques motivations, that in truth, the
[4:31] Speaker 2: infancy narratives are a call to spiritual revolution. They're subversive.
[4:36] Speaker 2: Why do you believe that, you know?
[4:38] Speaker 1: I go back here to Hans Ers van Baltazar, who said, Mike,
[4:42] Speaker 1: one of the marks of great architecture is that every
[4:44] Speaker 1: part of the building in a way speaks of the
[4:47] Speaker 1: whole building, or like a great sculpture, every part of
[4:51] Speaker 1: it is so integrated that it speaks in a way
[4:54] Speaker 1: of the whole. Right, there's something of that quality, He argued,
[4:57] Speaker 1: I think correctly about the Gospels, that every part of
[5:02] Speaker 1: the Gospel, every little bit, every story in it, every
[5:04] Speaker 1: image in it, in a way speaks of the entire gospel.
[5:08] Speaker 1: What's the gospel but the good news of an imperial
[5:12] Speaker 1: victory that God in Christ has won a victory over
[5:16] Speaker 1: the powers of the world. That's the good news. Well,
[5:20] Speaker 1: once you get that, you can see, Oh, every single
[5:23] Speaker 1: part of the gospel story speaks of the totality. And
[5:28] Speaker 1: the Christmas story is a very good example of that principle,
[5:30] Speaker 1: that it's not some little isolated saccharin introduction, but it
[5:36] Speaker 1: speaks of the Cross, of the resurrection, of the great
[5:40] Speaker 1: battle between the power of God and the powers of
[5:43] Speaker 1: the world.
[5:45] Speaker 2: All we can do is maybe walk through line by
[5:48] Speaker 2: line the Christmas narrative as presented in the Gospel of Luke.
[5:52] Speaker 2: So that'll be Luke Chapter two. This is the version
[5:54] Speaker 2: that's read on Morning Mass on Christmas Day. I think
[5:58] Speaker 2: each Christmas Liturgy uses a different gospel, but Morning Masses
[6:01] Speaker 2: from the Gospel of Luke. So luke'sccount begins like this.
[6:05] Speaker 2: In those days, a decree went out from Caesar Augustus
[6:09] Speaker 2: that the whole world should be enrolled. This was the
[6:12] Speaker 2: first enrollment when Quirinius was governor of Syria. So all
[6:17] Speaker 2: went to be enrolled, each to his own town. What
[6:21] Speaker 2: do we make of this opening passage.
[6:23] Speaker 1: There's several things actually packed in there. A first century
[6:26] Speaker 1: audience wouldn't have missed it. It begins the way most
[6:30] Speaker 1: great stories and epic poems would have begun in the
[6:33] Speaker 1: ancient world, by invoking these high and mighty figures. That's
[6:36] Speaker 1: what poets and writers bothered to write about, were these
[6:39] Speaker 1: great figures. So Quirinius, the Roman governor of Syria, and
[6:43] Speaker 1: then Caesar Augustus, who's the king of the whole world.
[6:46] Speaker 1: What's interesting is Luke is preparing his reader, though for
[6:50] Speaker 1: a surprise, because though he begins with those figures, they're
[6:54] Speaker 1: not the main characters. They're kind of ancillary characters, and
[6:58] Speaker 1: it's really about this little nobody couple making their way
[7:04] Speaker 1: to a little dusty outpost of the Empire of Caesar.
[7:07] Speaker 1: So it sets up a surprise, but it also does
[7:11] Speaker 1: something else, Brandon. It keeps those two figures in the
[7:16] Speaker 1: back of our minds. So as we read the story
[7:18] Speaker 1: of Christmas, we're meant to have Quirrhenius and especially Caesar
[7:23] Speaker 1: Augustus and mind because they're going to be the foil
[7:27] Speaker 1: to the real story that he's telling. The thing I
[7:32] Speaker 1: think we should notice about it is the census. And
[7:34] Speaker 1: that might strike us as kind of an innocent thing
[7:36] Speaker 1: to do, but not in a biblical framework at all. Remember,
[7:39] Speaker 1: in the Old Testament, David gets into a lot of
[7:41] Speaker 1: trouble with God when he calls for a census, and
[7:44] Speaker 1: they say why, Well, it was seen as a very
[7:48] Speaker 1: paradigmatically powerful and manipulative thing to do. If a king
[7:53] Speaker 1: counts his countrymen carefully, then he can tax them more efficiently,
[7:59] Speaker 1: he can draft them into the army more effectively. It
[8:02] Speaker 1: was a very aggressive sort of move. So as the
[8:06] Speaker 1: story of Christmas opens, you have the most powerful figure
[8:09] Speaker 1: in the world doing this paradigmatically sort of tyrannical thing.
[8:16] Speaker 1: You're meant to see. Oh, there he is the king
[8:19] Speaker 1: of the world doing a typically kingly thing. Now what's
[8:23] Speaker 1: going to be fun to watch is how Luke says,
[8:27] Speaker 1: that's not the king I'm really interested in, and he
[8:30] Speaker 1: paints the picture then.
[8:32] Speaker 2: So he does that almost immediately in the next verse,
[8:35] Speaker 2: because he says, Joseph and Mary went to Bethlehem, and
[8:39] Speaker 2: while they were there, the time came for her to
[8:42] Speaker 2: have her child, and she gave birth to her first
[8:45] Speaker 2: born son. She wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid
[8:49] Speaker 2: him in a manger because there was no room for
[8:52] Speaker 2: them in the inn. Now there's a lot there. I
[8:55] Speaker 2: want to focus on each of those phrases independently, but
[8:58] Speaker 2: let's start with the fact that there was no room
[9:00] Speaker 2: for them in the inn. Why is that detail significant?
[9:04] Speaker 1: Yeah, well, think of this. We're meant to hear the
[9:06] Speaker 1: contrast between Rome because he's mentioned Caesar Augustus, who's the
[9:10] Speaker 1: Emperor of Rome, and then Bethlehem. What's Bethlehem. Well, that's
[9:16] Speaker 1: this little nothing town, but it was the town of
[9:19] Speaker 1: King David. So you're seeing this contrast between the king
[9:23] Speaker 1: of the world, the Roman king and a new David
[9:28] Speaker 1: who's arriving right, So we're meant to see that. But
[9:31] Speaker 1: then think about this who had the greatest house in
[9:35] Speaker 1: the ancient world. Well, it would have been Caesar. If
[9:38] Speaker 1: you go to this day to Rome and you go
[9:40] Speaker 1: in the Roman Forum and you let's say you're facing
[9:43] Speaker 1: the Colosseum, look up to your right, and you'll see
[9:46] Speaker 1: this elevation that's called the Palatine Hill, and the palace
[9:52] Speaker 1: of the Emperor was up there, and it came from
[9:54] Speaker 1: that word polatina. Our words palazzo and palace and palais
[9:58] Speaker 1: come from that. So here's the best housed person in
[10:03] Speaker 1: the ancient world, and by contrast, here's this other king,
[10:09] Speaker 1: the new David, who has no place to stay. In fact,
[10:12] Speaker 1: even the lousy probably literally lousy traveler's hostile and little
[10:19] Speaker 1: Bethlehem even that wasn't good enough for him. So it's
[10:23] Speaker 1: the contrast between what's your vision of the good life.
[10:27] Speaker 1: Is it about being well housed and well protected and
[10:31] Speaker 1: living on the Palatine Hill or is it about something else.
[10:35] Speaker 1: That's what I think Luke is suggesting.
[10:39] Speaker 2: So again Luke tells us that after being born Jesus
[10:42] Speaker 2: was wrapped in swaddling clothes. I know this detail was
[10:46] Speaker 2: beloved by the church fathers who commented on it often.
[10:49] Speaker 2: But what is this signal?
[10:51] Speaker 1: A number of things, But I think of who is
[10:54] Speaker 1: the freest, rangiest person in the ancient world would have
[10:58] Speaker 1: been the Roman emperor could do whatever he wanted. He
[11:01] Speaker 1: had almost limitless power by that time, you know, so
[11:04] Speaker 1: the restrictions of the Roman Republic were gone, and we
[11:08] Speaker 1: have this imperial realm has emerged. So the emperor was uncontested,
[11:12] Speaker 1: really in his power. He do whatever he wanted.
[11:15] Speaker 4: Then you've got his little baby, tiny tiny baby, who
[11:18] Speaker 4: has almost no power, and more to it, is wrapped
[11:22] Speaker 4: up in these swaddling bands, which means he has.
[11:25] Speaker 1: Almost zero freedom of movement. Well, we got two kings,
[11:31] Speaker 1: don't we One vision of kingship boy is well protected
[11:35] Speaker 1: in his palace and he's able to do whatever he wants.
[11:40] Speaker 1: But then the true king no place to lay his
[11:43] Speaker 1: head and wrapped up. And what do we begin to
[11:47] Speaker 1: see in the course of the Gospel. It's when we
[11:50] Speaker 1: bind ourselves to the other in love, when we wrap
[11:55] Speaker 1: up our own egotism and we give ourselves to the
[11:58] Speaker 1: other in love, we find real life and real joy.
[12:03] Speaker 1: So it's again a contrast I think is being emphasized here.
[12:08] Speaker 2: So Luke tells us this newborn baby Jesus is wrapped
[12:11] Speaker 2: in swaddling clothes, but then he's placed in a manger.
[12:15] Speaker 2: He's laid in a manger. Luke says, what should we
[12:18] Speaker 2: take away from that?
[12:20] Speaker 1: I think a lot. We've seen so many Christmas cards
[12:23] Speaker 1: that it seems kind of like charmingly bucolic, and you know,
[12:27] Speaker 1: in the manger and the animals around. But what's a
[12:29] Speaker 1: manger in French? Means to eat? Right? Is a place
[12:34] Speaker 1: now where human beings eat in a civilized way. It's
[12:38] Speaker 1: where animals eat. It's a feeding trough for animals. I
[12:42] Speaker 1: mentioned how filthy it was, how gross it was, and
[12:46] Speaker 1: the fact that this new dividic king, who's forced to
[12:50] Speaker 1: be born in a cave we say, or something or stable,
[12:53] Speaker 1: is now placed in this filthy spot. You know. But
[12:58] Speaker 1: press another direction. Who was the best fed person in
[13:01] Speaker 1: the ancient world? It had to be Caesar Augustus in Rome.
[13:05] Speaker 1: Get whatever he wanted, any sensual pleasure he wanted, He
[13:08] Speaker 1: could get the best fed man in the world. The
[13:12] Speaker 1: fact that the new king is not so much fed,
[13:16] Speaker 1: but becomes food for the world. So the manger for
[13:20] Speaker 1: the animals is evocative of the one who will say,
[13:23] Speaker 1: when he comes of age, this is my body given
[13:26] Speaker 1: for you, This is my blood poured out for you.
[13:29] Speaker 1: He will become food for the other. Luke keeps asking
[13:34] Speaker 1: us which one of these is the true king?
[13:36] Speaker 4: Say?
[13:37] Speaker 2: Luke next shifts his focus away from the manger and
[13:41] Speaker 2: out to the fields, which is an interesting move. He
[13:44] Speaker 2: says that now there were shepherds in that region, living
[13:47] Speaker 2: in the fields and keeping the night watch over the flock.
[13:50] Speaker 2: The Angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the
[13:53] Speaker 2: glory of the Lord shown around them, and they were
[13:56] Speaker 2: struck with great fear. Why is it thinking that shepherds
[14:01] Speaker 2: were the first recipients of this good news outside of
[14:04] Speaker 2: the Holy Family.
[14:06] Speaker 1: Because they were such low lifes in the minds of
[14:09] Speaker 1: people of that time. Again, we get sort of romantic
[14:12] Speaker 1: about shepherds because we've seen so many Christmas cards and
[14:14] Speaker 1: Christmas paintings, and there's something romantic about, you know, the
[14:18] Speaker 1: shepherds in the field. But in the in Jesus' time
[14:21] Speaker 1: and place, shepherd was like a one step above a
[14:24] Speaker 1: sort of homeless person. It was kind of a drifter,
[14:27] Speaker 1: someone that couldn't get a better job, someone whose opinion
[14:31] Speaker 1: would never been respected. Someone like Caesar Augustus would be
[14:35] Speaker 1: as far as possible from a shepherd, you know, he
[14:38] Speaker 1: had nothing to do with shepherds. He'd have courtiers around him,
[14:41] Speaker 1: you know, high level figures. The great irony is that
[14:45] Speaker 1: the Angel of the Lord, the representative of God, the
[14:48] Speaker 1: heavenly power, speaks not to any of the courtiers of
[14:53] Speaker 1: Caesar Augustus, but speaks to these nobodies less than nobody's,
[14:58] Speaker 1: these these kind of despised mar originalized people. That's again
[15:03] Speaker 1: the turning upside down that's consistent in this story.
[15:08] Speaker 2: Many have noted how the first recipients of the good
[15:11] Speaker 2: news of the baby Christ being born out of the shepherds,
[15:14] Speaker 2: the nobodies, but then when Christ is raised from the dead,
[15:17] Speaker 2: the first to receive that news are the nobody, peasant women,
[15:21] Speaker 2: the last people you would expect to receive that is.
[15:24] Speaker 2: Is there a connection there, that this is the way
[15:26] Speaker 2: God reveals himself.
[15:27] Speaker 1: Yeah, and there's all kinds of links there. As you
[15:29] Speaker 1: suggest the church fathers, you know, where the wood of
[15:33] Speaker 1: the manger, Well, that's like the wood of the cross.
[15:35] Speaker 1: The swaddling bands of the baby Jesus are like the
[15:39] Speaker 1: shroud that wraps up his dead body. So you see
[15:42] Speaker 1: a lot of parallels between the Nativity account and the
[15:47] Speaker 1: crusc Fixion account.
[15:49] Speaker 2: Well, we then discover that the Angel who appears to
[15:52] Speaker 2: these shepherds says to them, do not be afraid, for behold,
[15:56] Speaker 2: I proclaim to you good news of great joy that
[15:59] Speaker 2: will be for all the people. For today, in the
[16:02] Speaker 2: city of David, a savior has been born for you,
[16:05] Speaker 2: who is Messiah and Lord. And this will be a
[16:08] Speaker 2: sign for you. You will find an infant wrapped in
[16:11] Speaker 2: swaddling clothes and lying in a manger. The first words
[16:15] Speaker 2: that the Angel speaks to these shepherds are do not
[16:18] Speaker 2: be afraid. Why is that notable?
[16:21] Speaker 1: That's always what the angels say. And you know, we've
[16:23] Speaker 1: got to see too many Renaissance paintings of angels as
[16:26] Speaker 1: little you know, bare bottomed babies and little you know,
[16:29] Speaker 1: cutesy pie figures. That's not an angel at all. In
[16:33] Speaker 1: the Bible, an angel's fearsome, and that's why their first
[16:37] Speaker 1: word is typically typically don't be afraid, which means babel,
[16:42] Speaker 1: we're afraid of them, And imagine this, this entity that
[16:47] Speaker 1: emerges out of another dimensional system and a much higher
[16:52] Speaker 1: pitch of ontological perfection suddenly breaks into your world. What
[16:59] Speaker 1: would your react be? I think fear is perfectly understandable.
[17:04] Speaker 1: So that's the first thing is we shouldn't get sentimental
[17:07] Speaker 1: about angels. They're fearsome characters. And look what he announces,
[17:13] Speaker 1: and this is now for the Jewish audience is not
[17:15] Speaker 1: going to miss any bit of this. This Messiah, and
[17:18] Speaker 1: Lord Maschiach is the Hebrew there rendered the Greek of
[17:24] Speaker 1: courses christas Christ, we say in English, the anointed One. Well, see,
[17:29] Speaker 1: any Jew hearing Maschiak would have thought David right away.
[17:33] Speaker 1: And we heard already it's in David's city. This is
[17:35] Speaker 1: taking place Bethlehem. The Angel of Denunciation, of course, has
[17:39] Speaker 1: said that this one will be on the throne of
[17:43] Speaker 1: his father David. So all these dividic overtones. And David
[17:47] Speaker 1: is indeed the great king of Israel. And the expectation
[17:51] Speaker 1: was he would take on the enemies of Israel, he'd
[17:55] Speaker 1: take on role we defeat them. And Luke is saying,
[17:58] Speaker 1: yes he will. But how powerful and interesting that he says.
[18:04] Speaker 1: And here he is Messiah Lord, the new David, the King,
[18:07] Speaker 1: and the sign will be a baby wrapped in swaddling,
[18:12] Speaker 1: clothed and lying in a manger. What that's the sign. See,
[18:17] Speaker 1: that's the upending that is implicit in the entire gospel,
[18:24] Speaker 1: because he's going to win this fight, not with the
[18:27] Speaker 1: weapons of the world. He's gonna win this fight precisely
[18:30] Speaker 1: by dying on the cross and rising from the dead.
[18:33] Speaker 1: And it's an opening up of a whole new world.
[18:36] Speaker 1: But it signaled right from the beginning by the angels.
[18:41] Speaker 2: So again we hear just from one angel who makes
[18:44] Speaker 2: this announcement to the shepherds. But then we discover in
[18:47] Speaker 2: Luke's gospel that suddenly there was a multitude of the
[18:52] Speaker 2: heavenly host, with the Angel praising God and saying glory
[18:56] Speaker 2: to God in the highest and on earth, peace to
[18:58] Speaker 2: those on whom his favor rests. You've noted before that
[19:02] Speaker 2: the Greek word used for host, the host of angels,
[19:06] Speaker 2: usually refers to an army. What's Luke getting at here
[19:09] Speaker 2: with that word choice?
[19:10] Speaker 1: And yeah, the English render there as host gives you
[19:13] Speaker 1: that sense you talk about, you know, the King coming
[19:15] Speaker 1: with his hosts to take on his enemy. But that's
[19:18] Speaker 1: the word is appearing with the single fearsome angel is
[19:24] Speaker 1: now an entire army of angels, so an overwhelmingly powerful
[19:32] Speaker 1: that doesn't even me to get it, extraordinary, frightening, unnerving
[19:39] Speaker 1: display of the heavenly power. Well, how come Caesar Augustus
[19:45] Speaker 1: was able to dominate the world because he had an
[19:48] Speaker 1: army that was in the eyes of the world just
[19:51] Speaker 1: like that. It was overwhelming, it was the best equipped,
[19:55] Speaker 1: it was the best trained, and all that. That's why
[19:58] Speaker 1: he was able to dominate the world. Luke is saying,
[20:00] Speaker 1: I know, I know, this baby looks like like nothing,
[20:04] Speaker 1: this baby wrapped in swaddling, clothed and lying in a manger.
[20:07] Speaker 1: But the baby has got an army of angels with him,
[20:13] Speaker 1: and that's far more powerful than anything that's in the world.
[20:18] Speaker 1: I'll tell you just to bring this back home. As
[20:20] Speaker 1: we record these words, I'm just what a couple of
[20:22] Speaker 1: weeks removed from the Synod, I was in Rome and
[20:26] Speaker 1: it just truck me over and over again. Everyone's thinking
[20:28] Speaker 1: about the Roman Empire today, right, that's the thing that
[20:30] Speaker 1: men think about the Roman Empire. Well, I thought about
[20:32] Speaker 1: it a lot when I was there, because you can't
[20:34] Speaker 1: miss it everywhere you go. They're signed to the Roman Empire.
[20:38] Speaker 1: But what are they? They're ruins. It's a wreck, it's
[20:42] Speaker 1: a wreck. There's dusty ruins remain. But there I was
[20:48] Speaker 1: as a bishop of the Catholic Church, founded by that baby, right,
[20:55] Speaker 1: founded by that baby who was put to death on
[20:58] Speaker 1: a miserable cross by Caesar's representative. And yet Caesar and
[21:04] Speaker 1: his empire they are long gone. But the baby with
[21:08] Speaker 1: the angel army one one, and that church weirdly, weirdly
[21:16] Speaker 1: endures to this day now full of sinful people like me.
[21:20] Speaker 1: I get it, and that's true. But weirdly, the Church
[21:25] Speaker 1: of the Baby King remains, and Caesar is long gone,
[21:31] Speaker 1: which tells me see that Luke was right, even though
[21:35] Speaker 1: when he was writing that story wasn't clear at all.
[21:39] Speaker 1: Let's say Luke's right in that I don't around your
[21:40] Speaker 1: eighty or so eighty five, maybe not clear at all.
[21:44] Speaker 1: Rome was the height of its power in that time.
[21:46] Speaker 1: The Church was this struggling reality in little corners of
[21:51] Speaker 1: the Roman Empire. But by God, he was right. The
[21:55] Speaker 1: Baby King did have an army of angels behind him
[21:59] Speaker 1: and doors to this day, even as the empires come
[22:04] Speaker 1: and go and break against the rock of the Church.
[22:08] Speaker 1: The Church remains. That to me is very much at
[22:11] Speaker 1: the heart of his story.
[22:12] Speaker 2: It reminds me of a story I know you've shared before.
[22:15] Speaker 2: I think actually it was in the Catholicism series of
[22:18] Speaker 2: your great hero and mentor a Cardinal George who was
[22:22] Speaker 2: thinking of the Roman Empire. How many days do you
[22:24] Speaker 2: think of the Roman times of day you think of
[22:25] Speaker 2: the Roman Empire? But it was I think at the
[22:28] Speaker 2: election of Pope and Indict the sixteenth. You want to
[22:31] Speaker 2: share that story.
[22:32] Speaker 1: Yeah, the camera's caught his face. Cardinal George came out
[22:37] Speaker 1: with the other cardinals they have he just elected Benedict,
[22:40] Speaker 1: and the Pope is waving, and then the other cardinals,
[22:43] Speaker 1: or the cardinals that remained came out on the balcony
[22:46] Speaker 1: and they were all kind of smiling and shaking hands
[22:48] Speaker 1: and so on. But the Cardinal George had this very
[22:51] Speaker 1: pensive expression on his face, and the cameras caught it.
[22:54] Speaker 1: So when he got home, people were curious and they said,
[22:57] Speaker 1: what were you thinking about as you stood there with
[23:00] Speaker 1: that very pensive look on your face? And he said, really,
[23:03] Speaker 1: what I've just said? He said, well, I was thinking
[23:05] Speaker 1: about the Palatine Hill and the Roman emperor, and how
[23:10] Speaker 1: you know, where's his successor? And finally, who cares? But
[23:16] Speaker 1: the successor of Peter. He's right there, He's right next
[23:19] Speaker 1: to me. And same idea, isn't it. You know, say
[23:23] Speaker 1: what you want about the church, and again, sinners like
[23:25] Speaker 1: me are in it. And you know, we individual sinners
[23:29] Speaker 1: can make a mess of things, but the Church remains.
[23:34] Speaker 1: It's a profound mystery. The more you think about it.
[23:38] Speaker 1: It's a confounding mystery. What other institution even is endured? None? None.
[23:45] Speaker 1: The Church is mysteriously there. And that's what's announced in
[23:48] Speaker 1: the Christmas story.
[23:50] Speaker 2: Let's close with this question, what should we make of
[23:52] Speaker 2: the fact that God chose to become incarnate in the
[23:57] Speaker 2: form of a baby. Presumably he could have come in
[24:00] Speaker 2: any shape, any form. He could have been a strong man,
[24:02] Speaker 2: a warrior, a king. He could have just appeared as
[24:05] Speaker 2: a king. Why a baby?
[24:07] Speaker 1: I Like our shared hero C. S. Lewis's line, he
[24:11] Speaker 1: had to sneak clandestinely behind enemy lines. So when the
[24:17] Speaker 1: Lord came, he didn't come bursting through the door of
[24:21] Speaker 1: the enemy. He was slipped like a spy, like a
[24:27] Speaker 1: secret agent, quietly behind enemy lines, so he wasn't noticed
[24:32] Speaker 1: at first. It's way too brandon of thinking about the
[24:35] Speaker 1: famous problem of the silent years of Jesus. You know
[24:39] Speaker 1: that it's also very mysterious the where you think about it.
[24:41] Speaker 1: Here's the Son of God comes, but for thirty years roughly,
[24:44] Speaker 1: let's say, or twenty eight years, whatever it is, he
[24:48] Speaker 1: just lived in this little nothing down Nazareth, you know,
[24:51] Speaker 1: with his mother and his friends, I guess, and a carpenter.
[24:57] Speaker 1: What gives Why didn't he just kind of just burst
[24:59] Speaker 1: into act, well, finding his time like a good impatient spy,
[25:04] Speaker 1: so he wouldn't be noticed as he came of age,
[25:07] Speaker 1: and only when his hour indeed had come right, was
[25:11] Speaker 1: he ready to manifest him himself. I think that's that's
[25:15] Speaker 1: still a powerful explanation of it.
[25:27] Speaker 2: Well, it's time now for our question from one of
[25:29] Speaker 2: our listeners. If you'd like to submit a question to
[25:31] Speaker 2: Bishop to Baron, you can do so at the website
[25:33] Speaker 2: Askbishop Baron dot com. Today we have one from Emily
[25:37] Speaker 2: in Australia. She's asking about the real presence of Christ
[25:40] Speaker 2: in the Eucharist.
[25:41] Speaker 3: Here's Emily, Hi, Bishop, I'm Emily from Sydney. Australia, and
[25:49] Speaker 3: I had a question about the Euchrist. I was recently
[25:52] Speaker 3: asked when defending the true presence, well, whose body is it? Infant,
[25:56] Speaker 3: crucified or resurrected Jesus jail? I had a sufficient answer,
[26:01] Speaker 3: can you help me?
[26:02] Speaker 1: Yeah, good question. I think the best way and the
[26:05] Speaker 1: simplest way to say it's it's the resurrected and glorified
[26:08] Speaker 1: Christ who's really present. Now to say that it's say
[26:11] Speaker 1: the Christ who is outside of space and time inclusive
[26:15] Speaker 1: of it. So I mean you could say the totality
[26:17] Speaker 1: of Christ's earthly life is also I mean really present
[26:21] Speaker 1: in the glorified body of the Lord. So I think
[26:25] Speaker 1: you could say it's both vanned in a way, it's
[26:27] Speaker 1: an all inclusive presence. But the best shorthand would be
[26:30] Speaker 1: to say that it's the glorified and risen Christ who's
[26:33] Speaker 1: really present.
[26:35] Speaker 2: Well, thanks simily for that question. Listen, as we near
[26:38] Speaker 2: the new year, maybe you want a resolution to move
[26:42] Speaker 2: yourself into a higher plane theologically, spiritually speaking, I encourage
[26:46] Speaker 2: you to check out the Word on Fire Institute. Now's
[26:49] Speaker 2: a great time to join. We've revamped the institute in
[26:52] Speaker 2: several ways. One is We have a brand new platform,
[26:55] Speaker 2: a mobile app. We have over forty courses in theology, philosophy, evangelization.
[27:00] Speaker 2: When you sign up, you'll get free books. You'll get
[27:02] Speaker 2: a free copy a free subscription of the Evangelization and
[27:05] Speaker 2: Culture Journal. You'll get access to all of Bishop Aaron's
[27:09] Speaker 2: films and study programs. There's a lot going on inside
[27:12] Speaker 2: the institute. We also have seminars, book clubs, writing groups,
[27:15] Speaker 2: a whole lot more. So check it out. Maybe make
[27:18] Speaker 2: that your New Year's resolution. Sign up today at the
[27:21] Speaker 2: website Wordonfire dot org, Slash Institute again, the websites Word
[27:25] Speaker 2: on Fire dot org, Slash Institute. Well, thanks so much
[27:29] Speaker 2: for watching and listening. We wish you a merry Christmas
[27:32] Speaker 2: and we'll see you next time on the Word on
[27:35] Speaker 2: Fire Show

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