Side by Side with Sinners

Sermons - Word on Fire · Jan 7, 2026

Bishop Robert Barron

Friends, we come to this wonderful feast of the baptism of the Lord. And the first thing to know is that this was a profoundly embarrassing event for the first Christians. Jesus is the son of God, the sinless Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world. So why is he going to John the Baptist to seek a baptism of repentance? Jesus begins his public ministry with a kind of embarrassing, humiliating act—and, in a way, that is the point of it.

Daily Reading

First Reading

Isaiah 42:1-4, 6-7

Here is my servant, whom I uphold,

my chosen, in whom my soul delights;

I have…