CHICAGO — At a time when Church scandals and weak catechesis sowed skepticism regarding the claims of Catholicism, Father Robert Barron began work on a television series that told the stories of saints, artists and scholars.

Catholicism, his acclaimed series, was broadcast on PBS and the Eternal Word Television Network (EWTN) and viewed by millions across the globe. Now, the Chicago priest, who also serves as the rector and president of the University of St. Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary, has embarked on another television project, Catholicism: The Pivotal Players, building on his conviction that the world is hungry for examples of virtue, wisdom and sanctity.

“I want to tell the stories of 10 people, including St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Catherine of Siena. The series will set these Catholic leaders in their historical context, but also show why they are relevant today,” Father Barron told the Register during a recent interview that discussed his work in media and at the seminary, where he has helped to reshape the curriculum to prepare future priests for 21st-century evangelization.

Indeed, a striking feature of Father Barron’s overlapping responsibilities is that they are anchored in a deep commitment to the New Evangelization.

“I appointed Father Barron as rector of the Seminary of St. Mary of the Lake because I thought he could do the job, like his predecessors before him,” Cardinal Francis George of Chicago told the Register, explaining why he chose the longtime seminary professor to lead Mundelein in 2012.

“His particular talent and interest in the New Evangelization also fits with the Church’s understanding of her mission,” the cardinal added.

As the Chicago priest considers the questions, concerns and blind spots of an emerging generation of young Americans, who are often turned off by organized religion, his multimedia apostolate, Word on Fire, serves as a kind of laboratory for feedback on the themes and arguments most likely to get a hearing in a distracted world.

For example, his YouTube film reviews offer a different kind of forum to engage the young and their search for transcendence, while discussing the latest vampire or science-fiction movie.

 

Drawing on Aquinas’ Legacy

But for all his new media savvy, Father Barron remains old school about some topics — like the need to reacquaint the faithful with the towering legacy of St. Thomas Aquinas.

His series Pivotal Players will outline some of Aquinas’ teaching about God, including “the idea of God’s non-competitiveness with man. He does not compete with human flourishing; he is the ground for human flourishing,” the priest explained.

The episode on Aquinas, he noted, will also address some of the assertions of the new atheists like Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins, who dismiss belief in the existence of God as an impediment to human freedom and happiness.

Father Barron’s decision to make Thomistic thought a central feature in his dialogue with modern atheists reflects his abiding interest in the saint’s teaching, dating to his freshman high-school religion class.

“One of the Dominican friars presented Aquinas’ argument from motion,” which asserts that everything that moves finds its origin in an Unmovable Mover — God. I was bowled over,” Father Barron recalled. “I went to the library and took out books on Aquinas. It triggered a deep interest that was first intellectual and then became a fascination with God,” sowing the seeds of his priestly vocation.

“I thought, ‘If he is all good and is real, why wouldn’t I give myself to God?’”

In the first half of the 20th century, Catholic apologists depended on Aquinas’ arguments for proving the existence of God, as they attempted to answer questions raised by would-be converts.

But, today, in a culture that often employs emotion, rather than logic, to debate hot-button issues, some fear that Aquinas has lost his power to persuade.

Father Barron disagrees with this assessment. While his first television series celebrated the power of beauty to transmit challenging religious truths, he still has faith in the power of reason.

Thus, Pivotal Players will reacquaint the public with the "Angelic Doctor." And Father Barron also contends that works by Aquinas should be on syllabii at Catholic universities and colleges.

“Our best people should be learning the arguments for God’s existence,” he said.

 

Seminaries and Evangelization

Meanwhile, Father Barron’s engagement with contemporary culture through his television productions and social-media apostolate has helped to inspire his mission at the seminary, where “evangelization is the organizing principle of every aspect of education and formation,” as he put it.

“In every area of the curriculum … we are not just conveying the teaching; we also [explore] what is blocking” people’s openness to this teaching, he said.

Further, seminary formation affirms the need for priests to develop a Christ-centered life, to acknowledge their sinfulness and to realize that life “is not about you,” he added. “You are a missionary, and you have to have a shepherd’s heart.”

Since Father Barron’s appointment as Mundelein’s rector and president, the resulting changes at the seminary have drawn national attention.

“Father Barron is the most effective evangelist in the United States today. His work at Mundelein ought to set a new standard for priestly formation in the U.S.,” George Weigel, the author of Evangelical Catholicism: Deep Reform in the 21st-Century Church,” told the Register.

But Father Barron’s growing profile as a Catholic leader and media figure also carries some risk. More than a few popular television evangelists have lost their moral bearings as the public flocks to hear their messages.

 Asked to explain how he maintains his bearings, Father Barron said that he depends on prayer.

“One very practical thing I have done is to ask lots of religious communities to pray for me,” he said, “and to pray for my protection.”

He recalled that, “after one scandal happened, Cardinal George took me aside and said, half joking and half serious, ‘You are not a guru; you are a priest.’”

“The danger is that you can become your own personal religion,” Father Barron acknowledged. “In fact, you are always a spokesman for the Church, and you have no authority outside of that.”

 

Spiritual Detachment

Father Barron said that he often turns for guidance and inspiration to the very saints and scholars who would be suitable subjects for a Pivotal Players episode or a seminary class.

He points to St. Ignatius of Loyola, author of The Spiritual Exercises, as an essential guide in the practice of spiritual detachment.

“Ignatius was asked, ‘What would you do if the pope suppressed the Jesuits?’ He responded, ‘I would need 15 minutes before the Blessed Sacrament, and then I would be fine,’” Father Barron recalled.

“If Word on Fire disappeared for some reason, I should be able to say, ‘Give me 15 minutes before the Eucharist, and I will be fine.’”

Joan Frawley Desmond is the Register’s senior editor.