Aug 20 Wed
Should I listen to God’s voice and accept the mission He has entrusted to me?
Bishop Barron tells young people in Rome to follow God and reject worldly goods, calling on them to “find their mission” and pursue the Lord “into the depths.”
“God has an idea of the saint you were meant to be.” He emphasized that modern culture promotes individualism at the expense of God’s journey with us.
Throughout his speech, Barron referenced biblical figures -including Peter, Abraham, Jacob, and Jonah- to highlight the challenges and rewards of answering God’s call.
There’s nothing more important in our lives than discerning our mission, Barron told the crowd.
He suggested that anyone discerning their mission should start by asking oneself, “Whom do I worship? What voice do I listen to? And what’s the mission that voice is giving to me?”
Comparing the ruins of Rome with the present Catholic Church, Barron said: “Don’t believe them when they tell you religion is in decline. … What’s in us is greater than anything in the world.”
“Where are the mighty signs of Roman power? Think of the Colosseum. Think of the Forum. Think of the Palatine Hill. Think of the Circus Maximus. What are they? They’re ruins.”
“But where’s the great empire that was announced by Peter the Apostle?” he continued. “It’s all over the world, on every continent. It’s alive. And where is the successor of Peter, who was put to death in the Circus of Nero and buried away on the Vatican Hill? Where’s his successor?”
“I saw him last night, didn’t you? Riding around St. Peter’s Square,” the bishop said to thunderous applause.
Barron warned against living in “the little shallows” of material desires and urged attendees to pursue a higher calling.
He paraphrased Abraham’s journey as our own: “Leave the country of who you are now. Leave that boring space of the old self, preoccupied with its own freedom, and go to the land I will show you. What’s that land? It’s the saint you’re meant to be.”
He warned the assembly not to worship money, status, or family. “If I make them my central preoccupation, I will fall apart on the inside — I will disintegrate and I will sow disintegration around me.”
“You become what you worship.”
“We know the call to radical love, and the way to go there.” “But we tend to go the other way.” Ignoring that call leads to internal and external storms. “Refusing your mission is bad for you and the people around you.”
Barron posed and answered the question “What happens when we accept the mission?” “You don’t know who you are until you find your mission.”
He concluded by linking the lives of Peter, Paul, and Jesus, each of whom embraced self-sacrifice for the good of others.
“That’s the same call they’re giving to all of you,” Barron said.