[Applause] Bishop Baron well God bless you all thank you what a sight this is and what a day it's been [Music] huh I've been a priest for 38 years and these days these days constitute one of the Great Moments of my priesthood I really mean that to see that procession today the enthusiasm and then that deep devotion of all of you to see this Gathering how could you deny that the holy spirit is here Among Us you know I saw the lineup for the speakers tonight and then I saw Jonathan roomy backstage Ag and I said great I get to be the first speaker on after Jesus you know I I came to know him very well when I was a bishop out in California and in fact he came to my house several times and uh California you can't all be from California anyway Jonathan came a couple times and I discovered he's great with voices as you know and that he and I share a great love for The Simpsons so one night we're on the back porch of my house and Jonathan roomy was doing the Simpson voices and at one moment I thought okay coming out of the face of Jesus is the voice of Homer Simpson and I thought my life is taking a weird turn you know anyway want to share some thoughts with you tonight everybody the great English Catholic apologist Ronald Knox said something that's always stayed with me ever since I read it KNX said that almost all of Jesus commands have been Dishonored or at best honored in the breach think of you know love your enemies and bless those who curse you and and uh don't judge and all the moral demand of Jesus time and again we disregard those but strangely KNX said there is a command of Jesus that we have over the centuries consistently obeyed and that is do this in remembrance of me despite our sins despite our failure despite our stupidity and all of that somehow we've known Everybody by a very deep Instinct that we must follow that command of the Lord we've known somehow in our hearts how indispensable the Eucharist is this is my body Jesus says this is my blood and because he's not just one Prophet among many not simply a a wisdom figure but rather God from God light from light true God from true God because he's that what he says is that's the basic theology of the church the Theology of the real presence that's why we're here but I want you to focus on maybe some words that we don't pay enough attention to Jesus indeed says this is my body but then he adds given up for you this is my blood shed for you what becomes really present in the Eucharist everybody is not just the body and blood blood of Jesus sort of dumbly and objectively there what becomes really present is Jesus body given Jesus blood poured out when we therefore consume the Eucharist we become what we eat right we become what we eat we become conformed to a love unto death we become become a body given for others we become blood poured out on behalf of others here's a it's a challenging idea but I'll offer it to all of you tonight your Christianity is not for you Christianity is not a self-help program something designed just to make us feel better about ourselves your Christianity is for the world Jesus said you're the light of the world if you put your light under a bushel basket it does no good you are the salt of the earth therefore you're meant to enhance what's good in the world you're meant to put to death what's bad in the world but if salt loses its Savor who can make it salty again you see the idea our Christianity is not for us we eat the body and drink the blood of Jesus which have been offered for the world think here everybody of dear Pope Francis the church that goes out from itself yes yes the Eucharist is not for us as a little private possession it's meant to conform us to Christ who gives his body blood soul and Divinity for the world it's Vatican 2 the great consilier document Lumen genium right the Light of the Nations who's the light well Christ we're meant to be the bearers of that light to the gentes to the world that's the whole ecclesiology of the church that's what animated John Paul the second Benedict the 16th Pope Francis the same idea the church that goes out from itself as I look at this great throng in this room gosh it lifts up my heart the energy in this room I mean it everybody the energy in this room could change our country it's true isn't it it's true do you know how many Catholics there are in America roughly 70 million we just shy of a quarter of the population think for one second look around this room as you do so think what if 70 million Catholics starting tonight began to live their faith radically and dramatically became body offered blood poured out we would change the country you know since Vatican 2 appropriately there's been a lot of talk about the rights and Privileges and prerogatives of the Le and that's right overcoming a sort of cramped clericalism and inviting the Le and all of that I love it I love it I'm totally for it but can I add maybe a word of challenge that's not been his stress along with the rights and prerogatives of the Ley is the obligation of the Le you know what Vatican 2 wanted Vatican 2 wanted great Catholic lawyers great Catholic politicians great Catholic writers great Catholic journalists great Cath Catholic parents great Catholic Educators going out into the world Vatican 2 said the seculum the the secular order that's your space move into it with Panache and energy and intelligence and enthusiasm and become body given blood poured out we'd set that country on fire look at us you got rights and privileges for sure and you've got this great sacred obligation you know Dorothy day has long been a hero of mine and back in the 1950s Dorothy Day complained about something she said there was a kind of two- tiered spirituality in the Catholic Church there was a spirituality of The Commandments that was for the it and it meant uh you know follow the basic Ten Commandments and that's all we can really expect of you and then there was what she called a council spirituality for the the clergy and the religious and so on what's that well the Evangelical counsels poverty Chastity obedience so beyond the the Commandments that's for the Ordinary People there's a kind of you know for the spiritual athletes they've got poverty Chast obes obedience Dorothy Day hated that she hated that distinction she look she loved clergy and she loved the consecrated religious but and she knew they live those things out in a distinctive way but she also knew no no there's not a two-tiered spirituality in the church the Le too were called to heroic sanctity the Le too are called to Poverty chastity and obedience so everybody in the brief time I got I just want to say something very simple about each one of those because I think in this living out of a council spirituality we'll see more concretely what it means to be Christ in the world so first poverty the Le are not called to the poverty let's say of a Franciscan frier or a trais monk that's a particular religious form of poverty someone's whistling for that all right good but listen to me now all the Le are indeed called to the Evangelical Council of poverty in what sense in the sense of what all the spiritual Masters call Detachment Detachment Jesus said seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and the rest will be added unto you what did he mean he meant a clarity about what you want and what you stand for the kingdom of God and the rest of life will kind of take care of itself in relation to that desire St Augustine said love God then love everything else for the sake of God then you'll be okay an image that I've shared if people that follow my work they know this but it's been so helpful to me over the years the image of the Wheel of Fortune not Vanna White but long before Vanna White in the Middle Ages there was this great symbol The Wheel of Fortune that turns inevitably at the top is a king he's got everything then the wheel turns and you have a king having lost his crown and then at the very bottom you've got a popper he's got nothing and then the wheel turns up this way and you've got someone climbing up to the top think wealth pleasure honor power all the things the world tells us will make us happy oh just fill your life up with enough of those you'll be happy that's living on the rim of the wheel am I right right that wheel the turns when you're on top of the Wheel of Fortune you got everything you've ever wanted all the wealth and power Fame you've ever wanteded the one thing you know is it's going to change you're going to lose it and someone who's seeking fame he's going to try to knock you out of that position to live on the everchanging rim of the wheel is to live in anxiety and addiction now sound familiar fellow sinners in this room all of us Ride The Wheel of Fortune to varying degrees spending our lives running after wealth pleasure honor and power the spiritual Masters say don't live on the rim live in the center of the wheel in the center is a depiction of Christ the same yesterday today and forever Christ who links us to the ET of God live in him and then you can watch as the wheel turns I'm rich I'm poor I'm forly rich I'm getting richer the wheel changes but I'm not living there see to live in that space is to live in the space of Detachment now listen rim of the wheel I'm caught in anxiety and addiction ition I'm obsessed with the worldly goods and therefore Grace Can't flow through me fellow Sinners we we waste so much of our Lives chasing after these these worldly Goods that will not satisfy us but if we live in Christ we live in the center of the wheel detached from the goods of the world then God can work through US Grace can flow through us into the world and that's the poverty if you want that all of you are called to that's the poverty that will indeed change the world can I give you one little thing from Pope Leo the 13th this is from rarum narum you know the document that founded the church's social teaching tradition he said this when the demands of necessity and propriety in your life have been met everything else you own belongs to the poor now can I suggest you that'll change your life if you let that sink in again when the demands of necessity and propriety in your life have been met so think now in terms of wealth pleasure honor power when you've got enough of those things to you know all right you have enough to to live well then everything else belongs to the poor you can't say that if you're living on the rim of the wheel you can only say that when you're living in the center in the place of Detachment okay so that's poverty secondly Chastity now there's celibate Chastity which is lived by religious and by priests and people often just conflate those two things celibacy and Chastity but Chastity is a much more general term it means living one's sexual life in a morally and spiritually responsible way it means sexual uprightness living your sexuality in a morally and spiritually upright way everybody is called to that let me put it this way yes you may applaud for for Chas the church gets such a bad rap on this I know and listen to the disaffiliating young people when they tell you why they're disaffiliating how often they say something like the church's sexual teaching you know it's just not fair and it's too puritanical and they're always wagging their finger this is the church's sexual teaching to bring one's sexuality completely under the egis of Love let me say that again to bring the whole of one's sexuality under the egis of love what's love not a feeling love Thomas aquinus said is willing the good of the other that's that's the whole Christian Life love one another right so now your sexuality lived in such a way that it's not primarily for your good but for the good of the other that your sexuality becomes an act of love can you see now everybody all of the church's teaching in the sexual Arena has nothing to do with puritanism no the Church Celebrate sexuality we're not a dualistic puritanical system but we want to bring the whole of life including your sexuality under the egis of Love think about you know some of the classical issues abortion and sexual abuse the objectification of both men and women adultery the hookup culture pornography what do all those things have in common none of them falls under the egis of love all of those are to varying degrees a sexuality turned in on itself Church isn't against sex it's against the sex divorced from Love okay let me give you a quote from St Pope Paul v 6 this is from the much maligned human Vite and Pope Paul here is talking indeed about contraception but I want you to hear the principle he articulates it's exactly what I've been talking about this is from Human another effect that gives cause for alarm in this area of contraception is that a man who grows a accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence due to a woman and disregarding her physical and emotional equilibrium reduce her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires no longer considering her as his partner whom he should surround with care and affection not bad that's the principle everybody that's the princip John Paul II said the same thing when he said never treat another human being as merely a means and not as an end in him or herself again reducing her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires that's what the church is against Chastity means living your sexual life in opposition to that that all of it becomes a gift of love now listen to me what would happen fellow Catholics here if beginning tonight 70 million Catholics decided to live according to Chastity what would happen abortion sexual abuse pornography the hookup culture objective ification of men and women all of that would be attacked all of that would be undermined you know if if we ring our hands at our our Wicked Fallen society and you know it is in many ways but do we turn the blame on ourselves that 70 million of us have not lived according to this great Evangelical counil oh that's that's for the clergy no says Dorothy Day no say I to tonight that's for everybody that's for everybody poverty and Chastity just one more then I'll stop poverty Chastity and obedience maybe the most important talk to priests they often tell you you know of the vows they take or the promises the toughest one is obedience I remember years ago ago when Cardinal George who was my great mentor and hero appointed me as Rector of mundeline Seminary it was maybe a month later hey mundeline maybe a month later and there was a big fundraiser and a lot of wealthy people were there and the Cardinal was there wearing his cassic like this and his red cape and everything well up to me comes a lady and she was just indignant and she said father Baron this this is the dumbest appointment I've ever heard you have this ministry word on fire that's going out around the country and you're doing your Evangelical work and now they got you out that little Seminary pushing papers around I think you being a Rector is the dumbest decision ever made and I said to her there's a little man in a red cape in the Next Room that can answer all your questions like lady I didn't decide this you know I well okay that's PRI obedience when you really hand your life over to your Superior when I was ordained I put my hands in the hands of cardinal Bernardine and I said I promise obedience to you and your successors okay that's Priestly obedience but lady lady you need to practice the Evangelical counsel of obedience too now in what sense what voice do you listen to there are so many voices there in songs they're in movies they're in politician speeches they're in the the culture what are they saying wealth pleasure power honor what once you see those big four I learned them from Thomas aquaintance once you see those you see them everywhere that's what all the voices are telling you how to get more and more and more of those things do you listen Obe right means to listen obedience do you listen to those or do you listen to a higher voice that's the whole Bible in a way everybody it's the whole Bible think of Abraham and and and Isaac and Jacob and and Moses and and Joshua and Peter and Paul and Isaiah Jeremiah what do they all have in common they heard the hubub of voices around them for sure but then they also heard that tiny Whispering voice that higher voice the voice of God what is that voice the one that tells you don't seek after these worldly Goods but do the right thing don't seek after what the world tells you but be a good person don't worry about wealth pleasure power honor rather do what God wants you to do especially know young people here listen to me that's all that matters everything else in your life is a footnote what matters is which voice do you listen to obedience Obed you know a great modern telling of this biblical story is one of my favorite movies Field of Dreams um do you remember in Field of Dreams when he hears this any Ians are probably cheering for that huh all right my dases is just North of Iowa my Winona Rochester dases but you know he's going about his business and he hears this strange tiny Whispering voice if you build it he will come and despite the the appr probium of his of his U neighbors despite the rejection of his family he listens to that voice he builds that baseball field which becomes a conduit to a higher World connects him to past and future connects him to the sacred there's the metaphor everybody what are you listening to which voice are you following you know what the biggest problem is today I think in our culture it's what I call the culture of self-invention it's rampant everywhere what I mean is hey I decide who I am I decide the meaning of my life I decide what it's all about don't you tell me no Authority tells me I decide yes even my gender I'll decide the self-invention culture is repugnant to what I'm talking about and what the Bible's talking about when we hear hear the voice of God God tells us who we should be how we should live which voice to follow everything else will be a footnote I've shared before hanor von baltazar's Great distinction between the ego drama and the theod drama the ego drama that's the one I'm writing I'm directing I'm producing it and I'm the star right the bishop Baron story now on the road in Indianapolis that's the ego drama bore me to death with the ego drama bore me to death with that what's the Theo drama the drama that God's writing God's producing God's directing and he's got a role for you that might be nothing in the eyes of the world but who cares whom do you listen to which voice the Le are called to be obedient in this radical spiritual sense and that's how you find your Holiness just a last thought go to the very last book of the Bible the Book of Revelation the Heavenly Jerusalem comes down representing the culmination of Revelation the world being now what God wants it to be The Shining City and curiously in that Heavenly Jerusalem there's no Temple and you think how strange that is the temple was why people came to [Music] Jerusalem there's no temple in the Heavenly Jerusalem because listen the whole city has become become a temple think of a city with with educational institutions and businesses and and sports Arenas like this and and Symphony theaters and and all the activity of a city what if every bit of it was turned to the praise of God what if every bit of it found its fulfillment in God well then the whole city would be a temple there's the the job of the Le everybody and I'll close with this your job bring the lummen to the gentes bring the Light of Christ out into the secular world this great Revival will have been a failure if we don't change our society if we don't stream forth from this place with the Light of Christ become the people you're meant to be and Katherine of Sienna said it become the people God wants you to be and you will set the word on fire the word on fire the world on fire God bless you all