I am 64 years of age and a cradle Catholic. These days I attend mass at least 3 times a week. Only once in my life have I walked out of Church in silent protest during a sermon because of how far the priest had abused his position at the lectern. On Sunday Sept 5th 2026 I did so again. This walk out was not physical like the slow dejected steps I took out of my beloved Church the first time. It was metaphorical when I was forced to cut the sermon short by switching my computer off during Bishop Robert Barron’s Sunday you tube sermon entitled ‘ Will the Good of the Other ’.
Bishop Barron had recently read a book called ‘ Suicidal Empathy ’ and could not contain his evangelical zeal for its essential proclamation to his 3.64 million you tube followers that ‘Empathy is not always and everywhere the right thing to do’, and ‘that it threatens truth, reality, justice ’ and love. Listening to Bishop Barron was like watching the Good Samaritan look, shrug his shoulders and walk by.
I had enough justification for ‘walking out’ of Bishop Barron’s sermon on the basis that it violently contradicted Pope Leo’s recent assertion that empathy is ‘a call from God’ but had I not done so for that reason alone Bishop Barron provided an unholy host of further justifications why I should escape his misleading words, disingenuous anecdotes and perhaps worst of all his duplicitous manipulation of the teachings of St. Augustine, St. Paul , St. John , Chesterton, Dostoevsky and most shamefully Jesus himself.
Pope Leo tells us ‘Empathy is a call from God ‘
Throughout his sermon The Bishop, conducts his show like an accomplished conjurer. He repeatedly replaces priceless diamonds with pieces of cut glass and then bases his whole thesis on why empathy will propel us into the apocalypse because empathy is the piece of cut glass he holds triumphantly in his hand and not the priceless ‘gift from God’ that Pope Leo tells us it is. He starts these conjuring tricks by casually , almost imperceptibly , expecting us to believe his woefully inaccurate definition of what empathy is by saying that empathy is a desire ‘not to hurt or wound’ the feelings of others’ . This is absolutely not what empathy is. The fact that Bishop Barron then insists on trying to convince us that empathy is an existential threat to humanity based on his woefully inaccurate definition of what empathy is simply invalidates almost every word that subsequently escapes his mouth.
Bishop Barron desperately needs us to believe that empathy is a desire ‘not to hurt or wound’ the feelings of others because if we don’t then his misleading anecdotes ‘woking out’ minorities, parents , the trans community, even penitents in the confessional would be seen for what they are , extreme examples of the growing hatred, intolerance and marginalization of an increasing number of our Sisters and Brothers rejected by adherents of the de humanizing cultural parameters of Right wing ideology.
As Bishop Barron’s gets even more confused he admonishes those who say Empathy is a supreme value saying ‘ Empathy is not the centre around which all of our value system revolves ……… and if you put empathy, so defined , in the centre of your preoccupation, truth , reality , justice and Love are going to be threatened’ . Well of course empathy is not a supreme value . We know it isn’t and it appears that Bishop Barron is the only one saying it is. Then after conjuring up yet another misleading basis for the falsehoods that follow he tells us that Empathy is standing against Love in an epic battle for supremacy which could lead to the end of times. The real problem here is not that we could be looking the end times straight in the eye but that the only one who has said that Empathy is putting itself forward as a supreme value is Bishop Barron. Once again because his thesis is based on a falsehood everything Bishop Barron subsequently says about Empathy challenging Love is quite simply indefensible.
As a Brother in Christ I will try to help Bishop Barron understand what empathy is , why it will not result in ‘societal suicide, why he should disregard Gad Saad’s book on the subject and why Pope Leo calls it a ‘gift from God’.
Lets us say that Love is a wedding cake. A wedding cake baked to celebrate the Divine union between the Holy Trinity and humanity. It is made up of many ingredients amongst which are Mercy, Justice, Truth, Forgiveness and wait for it , Empathy. Love only becomes authentic with these ingredients present. Love is the supreme value. None of the ingredients are supreme values but they are irreplaceable to ensure that the cake is baked to The Almighties recipe. The ingredients are not in competition with the cake but rather they are an essential factor in ensuring that the cake becomes the perfection that the Holy Trinity willed for humanity. Like all good recipes the final product is lacking if any of the essential ingredients are missing. If Empathy is not present the cake will simply not rise to its full glory.
Without empathy the cake tastes bitter and unpalatable and has no substance, rather like a Bishop who without empathy has no legitimacy within the confessional or at the altar.
Bishop Barron owes his 3.64 million followers an apology for misleading them regarding the ‘ Gift from God’ that is empathy. He should take his ‘Will the Good of the Other’ sermon off his you tube channel at the earliest opportunity to prevent any further damage to the faithful and perhaps it would be worth sharing the recipe above with his friends. I think Gad Saad might find it pretty tasty.
God Bless you and yours
Peace and Love
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“I may speak in tongues of men or of angels but if I am without Love I am a sounding gong or a clanging cymbal. I may have the gift of prophesy and know every hidden truth; I may have Faith strong enough to move mountains but if I have no Love I am nothing. I may dole out all I possess or even give my body to be burnt but if I have no Love I am none the better. Love is patient; Love is kind and envies no one. Love is never boastful nor conceited nor rude; never selfish, not quick to take offence. Love takes no score of wrongs; does not gloat over others men’s sins but delights in the Truth. There is nothing Love cannot face; there is no limit to its Faith, its Hope and its Endurance.”
1 Corinthians 13: 1-7
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