# The Earliest Moments of the Church - Bishop Barron's Sunday Sermon

An episode of [Daily Sermons With Bishop Robert Barron](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/6783446284), 28 Jul 2026, 15 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/73038742/the_earliest_moments_of_the_church_bishop_barron_s_sunday_sermon.mp3



## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: Peace be with you friends.
[0:01] Speaker 2: It's the fifteenth Sunday, ordinary time, and our gospel is
[0:04] Speaker 2: from the sixth chapter of Mark, Mark, the first Gospel.
[0:08] Speaker 2: This rather spare understated gospel, but gosh, every part of it,
[0:12] Speaker 2: precisely for that reason, is worth paying attention to. The
[0:16] Speaker 2: one for today is Jesus sending the twelve out on mission.
[0:21] Speaker 1: And here's why I particularly love this.
[0:24] Speaker 2: We are at if you want, the very earliest moments
[0:28] Speaker 2: of the Church.
[0:29] Speaker 1: In a way, it's the pre church.
[0:31] Speaker 2: Because we're prior to the death and resurrection of the
[0:35] Speaker 2: Lord and the sending of the Spirit. You might say,
[0:37] Speaker 2: after that, after Pentecost, you have the Church in the
[0:41] Speaker 2: full sense on display. So we're like in a pre church,
[0:45] Speaker 2: the earliest moments. But for that, for a reason, it's
[0:48] Speaker 2: really important for us to pay attention to what the
[0:52] Speaker 2: Lord tells them. I might have told this story before,
[0:55] Speaker 2: but gosh, it haunts my mind. Cardinal George's last speech
[1:00] Speaker 2: to the priests of Chicago when he said, remember, brothers,
[1:04] Speaker 2: in the early Church, there was no Vatican.
[1:06] Speaker 1: There were no.
[1:06] Speaker 2: Dioceses, no chancery offices, no parishes, no Catholic schools, no
[1:10] Speaker 2: Catholic hospitals. In other words, none of the institutional apparatus
[1:14] Speaker 2: of a church was around. However, he said there were evangelists.
[1:20] Speaker 2: And his point, which is, gosh, it's so well taken,
[1:23] Speaker 2: so important. Can we forget sometimes what we are primarily
[1:29] Speaker 2: about as we're preoccupied with the institutional structure of the church. Now,
[1:34] Speaker 2: another reason I personally find this very compelling is Jesus
[1:38] Speaker 2: summons the twelve so it's twelve apostles and sends them out. Well,
[1:43] Speaker 2: as a bishop, I'm a successor to the apostles, however
[1:47] Speaker 2: unworthy I am. Of course, they were all that worthy.
[1:51] Speaker 2: Whenever we say that, we think, well, you look at
[1:53] Speaker 2: the apostles in the scriptures. But the twelve, the twelve, well,
[1:57] Speaker 2: these are the first bishops. What does Jesus tell them
[2:01] Speaker 2: to do? He doesn't talk about chancery offices. You know
[2:04] Speaker 2: what I think of my work, Maybe what immediately comes
[2:07] Speaker 2: to my mind is, you know, the chancery and administrative
[2:09] Speaker 2: responsibilities and raising money, and you know, all those good
[2:12] Speaker 2: and important things. But what does Jesus tell the first bishops?
[2:17] Speaker 2: The first twelve. Well, let's notice a couple of things.
[2:22] Speaker 2: He began to send them out two by two, we
[2:26] Speaker 2: are an apostolic religion.
[2:27] Speaker 1: Period.
[2:29] Speaker 2: Yes, they had their kind of intimate time with the
[2:32] Speaker 2: Lord where they listened to him and they were with
[2:34] Speaker 2: him and they attended to him.
[2:37] Speaker 1: But then he sends them.
[2:40] Speaker 2: In fact, a postellane in Greek means to send, So
[2:43] Speaker 2: an apostle is someone sent out. It's a very basic
[2:49] Speaker 2: dynamic now of the church at its best. It doesn't
[2:53] Speaker 2: hunker down, it doesn't settle for the status quo. The
[2:58] Speaker 2: church goes out, sent by the Lord. There's a sort
[3:03] Speaker 2: of healthy restlessness about the church at its best, never
[3:08] Speaker 2: satisfied with what we have, always looking for more, going
[3:13] Speaker 2: to get more people for Christ. I like that holy
[3:18] Speaker 2: restlessness that should mark the church. Notice too, he sends
[3:23] Speaker 2: them out two by two. Christian religion is never this
[3:28] Speaker 2: sort of lone ranger business. It's a corporate identity. So
[3:32] Speaker 2: even as they go out on mission, they go out
[3:35] Speaker 2: two by two. They're connected to each other, and they're
[3:39] Speaker 2: connected through each other to Christ. It's never just a
[3:44] Speaker 2: I'm the one guy, I'm the apostle. It's two by
[3:48] Speaker 2: two corporately as a mystical body, the church is sent
[3:54] Speaker 2: But I listen, he sends them, and what's The first
[3:57] Speaker 2: thing we hear about the mission, what the Lord wants
[4:01] Speaker 2: him to do. Listen, he gave them authority over unclean spirits. Okay,
[4:08] Speaker 2: you think of the work of the church, you think
[4:10] Speaker 2: of the work of a bishop.
[4:12] Speaker 1: I bet for.
[4:13] Speaker 2: Most of us what does not leap to mind is
[4:16] Speaker 2: expelling demons.
[4:18] Speaker 1: But there it is.
[4:21] Speaker 2: The first thing he gives them is authority, mind you.
[4:26] Speaker 2: So he's not sending them out, you know, with with nothing,
[4:29] Speaker 2: equipped with nothing. Hey, guys, you're on your own, do
[4:32] Speaker 2: the best you can. No, No, he gives them a
[4:35] Speaker 2: share in his own ex usia. That's the lovely Greek
[4:40] Speaker 2: word there, which means from the being of See Jesus
[4:44] Speaker 2: speaks with authority, because he speaks out of his own divinity.
[4:49] Speaker 2: Will we Christian ministers? Do we believe this? We bishops
[4:52] Speaker 2: and priests, And so we're sent out clothed in that
[4:57] Speaker 2: authority to do what spiritual warfare? Spiritual battle? Now, I
[5:06] Speaker 2: know you think it right away of the exorcystem. Yes,
[5:09] Speaker 2: there are those very dramatic instances of demonic possession, but
[5:12] Speaker 2: let's face the devil, the dark powers, they manifest themselves
[5:16] Speaker 2: in all kinds of more subtle ways. Wherever you find accusation,
[5:21] Speaker 2: wherever you find division, wherever you find cruelty, wherever you
[5:24] Speaker 2: find hatred, wherever you find temptation, that's the dark power.
[5:30] Speaker 1: That's the devil. The church's first job.
[5:34] Speaker 2: Its ministers are clothed with authority to deal with this
[5:39] Speaker 2: demonic power. I just wonder again, everyone, do we think
[5:44] Speaker 2: of that naturally and immediately as the work of the.
[5:47] Speaker 1: Church we should do?
[5:49] Speaker 2: We see ourselves engaging in spiritual warfare. You know, look
[5:54] Speaker 2: at every.
[5:55] Speaker 1: Single story of the hero there's.
[5:58] Speaker 2: Always a battle with the dragon. That's an old name,
[6:02] Speaker 2: by the way, for the devil, drochcole in Latin, the dragon. Yep,
[6:06] Speaker 2: we've been given authority. We should use it. But then listen.
[6:11] Speaker 2: He instructed them to take nothing for the journey but
[6:14] Speaker 2: a walking stick, no food, no sack, no money in
[6:17] Speaker 2: their belts. Now I think about this. I know still
[6:20] Speaker 2: travel a lot in my work to give talks and
[6:23] Speaker 2: go to meetings and do various things. You know, so
[6:26] Speaker 2: I go to airports all the time. I couldn't imagine
[6:30] Speaker 2: arriving at an airport without a suitcase and without a wallet,
[6:34] Speaker 2: no money, no credit cards, and no suitcase. I'm just
[6:36] Speaker 2: got just gonna go. I mean, what, I have that
[6:40] Speaker 2: kind of confidence. But that's how he sends the first
[6:44] Speaker 2: bishops out. You know, he imitates this. See a lot
[6:47] Speaker 2: of the saints up and down the ages. Frances Messi
[6:49] Speaker 2: tried to live this way, and his first followers lived
[6:52] Speaker 2: this way. You know, thousands came to join Francis and
[6:55] Speaker 2: they didn't have dormitories or monasteries. He said, oh, there's
[6:59] Speaker 2: the woods. Go live in the woods, trusting in God's providence.
[7:03] Speaker 2: Think of the stories of Saint Brendan and those Irish
[7:05] Speaker 2: monks that would just get in a boat and they
[7:06] Speaker 2: drift out to sea and wherever they happen to land,
[7:09] Speaker 2: that's where they build their monastery. Trusting, trusting in God's providence. Well,
[7:17] Speaker 2: how important it is everybody for the life of the church.
[7:20] Speaker 2: Do we have that confidence or do we rely way
[7:25] Speaker 2: too much on our institutions to give us that kind
[7:28] Speaker 2: of support and that confidence.
[7:31] Speaker 1: Do we trust? Do we trust in the Lord as
[7:34] Speaker 1: we do our work?
[7:36] Speaker 2: You know, just recently, in fact, that this very room
[7:39] Speaker 2: where I'm recording these words, this young man who's a
[7:42] Speaker 2: Jesuit novice king, and he was on his pilgrimage the
[7:46] Speaker 2: Jesuit order, I think is beautiful. They compel their novices
[7:49] Speaker 2: to do this, give them a little bit of money
[7:52] Speaker 2: and maybe one bus ticket, and they say, I want
[7:54] Speaker 2: you to get from point A to point B. And
[7:56] Speaker 2: the idea is, you don't have money in your belt,
[7:59] Speaker 2: you don't have credit card. You're relying upon the providence
[8:03] Speaker 2: of God to lead you to people that will help you.
[8:06] Speaker 1: Well, that does something to your soul when.
[8:09] Speaker 2: That gets deep down inside of you, that kind of trust,
[8:12] Speaker 2: that kind of risk. Well that's how he sends the
[8:15] Speaker 2: first bishops out on their journey.
[8:18] Speaker 1: I love this.
[8:19] Speaker 2: They were, however, to wear sandals, so you know, no money,
[8:24] Speaker 2: but sandals. Why cause you're going to be walking. Because
[8:28] Speaker 2: I'm sending you out, I don't want you sitting around.
[8:31] Speaker 2: I want you moving from place to place. You know,
[8:35] Speaker 2: that's very important.
[8:37] Speaker 1: Sandals, yes, and also a walking stick.
[8:42] Speaker 2: Now think about this first of all, practically, if you're walking,
[8:45] Speaker 2: especially in the rough roads of the ancient world, this
[8:49] Speaker 2: was a very valuable thing to have if you're going
[8:51] Speaker 2: to be a walker. But there's something else here. Think
[8:54] Speaker 2: of Moses with his staff, Think of Aaron with his staff.
[8:58] Speaker 2: Think even in this mythic content someone like Gandolf with
[9:01] Speaker 2: the staff. The staff in the ancient world was a
[9:05] Speaker 2: symbol of power and authority. Once again, the Lord is
[9:10] Speaker 2: not sending them out unprepared. They don't have a bit
[9:16] Speaker 2: of the of the of the power and authority and
[9:18] Speaker 2: security of the world. That's true, that's stripped away. But
[9:22] Speaker 2: by God, they have the authority of the Gospel. They
[9:26] Speaker 2: have the authority of Christ. I do wonder, friends of times,
[9:30] Speaker 2: if we leaders of the church forget this, forget the
[9:36] Speaker 2: and I don't mean authority.
[9:37] Speaker 1: It's I'm oppressive.
[9:37] Speaker 2: I'm going to tell you what to do, since I
[9:39] Speaker 2: mean the spiritual authority. You know. I love Spielberg's movie
[9:45] Speaker 2: about Lincoln, and of course Lincoln is famously humble figure.
[9:48] Speaker 2: But there's a scene where he's being challenged at the
[9:51] Speaker 2: end of the movie, and because it's Lincoln, this humble man,
[9:54] Speaker 2: it has so much more power. He rises from the
[9:57] Speaker 2: table and he says, I am the present of the
[10:00] Speaker 2: United States of America, closed in immense power. And he's
[10:06] Speaker 2: making a particular point there. But that scene stays in
[10:09] Speaker 2: my mind. I wonder, do we leaders of the church
[10:14] Speaker 2: claim that same sort of power and again, not bossing
[10:17] Speaker 2: other people around power, I mean spiritual power. That's what
[10:22] Speaker 2: that staff symbolizes. Do we claim it? And do we
[10:28] Speaker 2: use it against the dark powers? That's how the Lord
[10:31] Speaker 2: sent them out. Now, listen, wherever you enter your house,
[10:36] Speaker 2: stay there until you leave. Whatever place does not welcome
[10:40] Speaker 2: you or listen to you, leave there and shake the
[10:43] Speaker 2: dust off your feet and testimony against them. Did the
[10:48] Speaker 2: Lord know from the beginning that some people would reject
[10:54] Speaker 2: the gospel?
[10:55] Speaker 1: Yes?
[10:57] Speaker 2: Does he want all to be saved? Yes, and he
[11:00] Speaker 2: sends go out to all the end of the world,
[11:02] Speaker 2: declare to everybody. But does he know just as he
[11:07] Speaker 2: was opposed, they would be opposed. We should not be surprised,
[11:14] Speaker 2: we proclaimers of the Gospel that we will meet with opposition. Now,
[11:18] Speaker 2: if you doubt me on this, go any time of
[11:21] Speaker 2: the day or night on the internet and start talking
[11:23] Speaker 2: about religion. You will see in very short order the
[11:29] Speaker 2: opposition to the Gospel.
[11:32] Speaker 1: But I love how I don't know kind of.
[11:35] Speaker 2: Insucially he talks about this, you know, so would people
[11:38] Speaker 2: reject you? Shake the dust off your feet, and on
[11:41] Speaker 2: you go. In other words, don't obsess over that. Why
[11:45] Speaker 2: why are they rejecting? Jesus was rejected. You'll be rejected.
[11:51] Speaker 2: It is par for the course. When the church's preoccupation
[11:55] Speaker 2: becomes everybody's got to like me, then we've lost our way, period,
[12:01] Speaker 2: end of argument.
[12:03] Speaker 1: If our goal is well.
[12:04] Speaker 2: Let's make sure everybody gets along and no one finds
[12:07] Speaker 2: us offensive, we have lost. We have we've lost the
[12:12] Speaker 2: theme we were not the church. Opposition will come of course.
[12:17] Speaker 2: Now that's it closes. So they went off with these instructions,
[12:22] Speaker 2: and what do they do? Preached repentance?
[12:26] Speaker 1: Uh.
[12:27] Speaker 2: The first word out of Jesus Mouth in Mark's Gospel
[12:31] Speaker 2: is metanoiaite, which means repent, change your mind, change your life,
[12:36] Speaker 2: turn around. It certainly is not hey, you're all doing great.
[12:42] Speaker 2: I'm okay, you're okay, everyone's good. That is not the gospel.
[12:48] Speaker 2: The first word out of Jesus Mouth is repent. The
[12:51] Speaker 2: first thing he tells them to do is to preach repentance.
[12:58] Speaker 2: Are we calling people? I mean we lead of the church,
[13:00] Speaker 2: we bishops. Are we calling people to repentance? That's our
[13:04] Speaker 2: first task. There's a great story about Dorothy Days. We
[13:09] Speaker 2: toward the end of her life. She died nineteen eighty
[13:11] Speaker 2: and this is nineteen seventy six. The year of the
[13:13] Speaker 2: bi centennial, and Time magazine had a feature where they
[13:18] Speaker 2: asked famous people, do you have a message for America.
[13:21] Speaker 1: On its bi centennial.
[13:22] Speaker 2: Some people said all these nice, encouraging, patriotic things, And
[13:26] Speaker 2: they came to Dorothy Day and said, do you have
[13:28] Speaker 2: a message for America on our bi centennial?
[13:32] Speaker 1: And she said yes, repent.
[13:36] Speaker 2: Well, you know, maybe it didn't suit the readership of
[13:38] Speaker 2: Time magazine, but by God, it suited exactly what Jesus
[13:42] Speaker 2: told his disciples to do.
[13:43] Speaker 1: So finally, so the twelve drove out many demons. They
[13:47] Speaker 1: anointed with oil, many who were sick and cured them. Okay,
[13:54] Speaker 1: we're a healing ministry. The church is about healing at
[13:59] Speaker 1: the spit level, at the physical level. Christ is savatur
[14:06] Speaker 1: with Saint Latin. Our word savior comes from that Salvatore
[14:10] Speaker 1: means healer. Is the church bringing healing power. Remember, we're
[14:17] Speaker 1: clothed with immense power. We're clothed with authority from the
[14:20] Speaker 1: Holy Spirit to drive out the dark powers and to
[14:24] Speaker 1: bring healing at all levels spiritually, psychologically, physically. Well, there
[14:31] Speaker 1: it is everybody mark six, seven through thirteen. If you
[14:34] Speaker 1: want to check it. There's the program what's the church.
[14:39] Speaker 2: Well, at the beginning, there weren't any of those things
[14:41] Speaker 2: Cardinal George mentioned. This is what Jesus saw from the beginning,
[14:46] Speaker 2: and this still ought to inform everything we do today.
[14:51] Speaker 1: And God bless you.
[15:00] Speaker 2: No

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