Robert Barron

Barron was the host of Catholicism, a documentary TV series that aired on PBS. His social media following has earned him the monikers "bishop of Catholic social media" and the "bishop of the Internet". His 2016 film series, Catholicism: The Pivotal Players, was syndicated for national television in the United States.

Barron is a religion correspondent and commentator for NBC and Fox News.

Life and clerical career

Early life

Robert Emmet Barron was born on November 19, 1959, in Chicago, Illinois. He is of Irish descent. He spent his childhood first in Detroit, then in the Chicago suburb of Western Springs. His mother was a homemaker, and his father, who died in 1987, was a national sales manager for John Sexton & Company, a national food distributor. He has a sister, Pat Callahan, a teacher at Lyons Township High School in the Chicago western suburbs, and a brother, John Barron, who was the Sun-Times Media Group's publisher.

Barron started reading the works of Thomas Aquinas when he was a freshman at Fenwick High School, a private Dominican high school. He transferred to Benet Academy, a private Benedictine high school, where he graduated in 1977.

Barron attended the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana, for a year before transferring to Mundelein Seminary in Mundelein, Illinois. One year later, he was accepted as a Basselin Scholar at the School of Theology of the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., where he earned a Bachelor of Philosophy degree in 1981 and a Master of Philosophy degree in 1982; his master's thesis was on the political philosophy of Karl Marx. Barron earned a Licentiate of Sacred Theology from Mundelein Seminary in 1986.

Priesthood

Barron was ordained to the priesthood for the Archdiocese of Chicago on May 24, 1986, by Cardinal Joseph Bernardin.

After serving as an associate pastor of St. Paul of the Cross Catholic Parish in Park Ridge, Illinois, from 1986 to 1989, he was sent to France and earned a Doctor of Sacred Theology at the Institut Catholique de Paris in 1992. His dissertation was titled "Creation as Discipleship: A Study of the De potentia of Thomas Aquinas in Light of the Dogmatik of Paul Tillich".

In addition to his native English, Barron is fluent in French, Spanish, German, and Latin. He is a proponent of Hans Urs von Balthasar's "dare we hope" theology, declaring there is "objective ground" for a "hope that all men may be saved".

From 1992 until 2015, Barron was a professor of systematic theology at University of St. Mary of the Lake, where he was also named the inaugural Francis Cardinal George Professor of Faith and Culture in 2008. He also served as president-rector from 2012 to 2015.

Barron lectured extensively in the United States and internationally, including the Pontifical North American College and the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas in Rome. In 2000, Barron launched Word on Fire Catholic Ministries, a non-profit organization, that supports his evangelistic endeavors. Word on Fire programs, featuring Barron, have been broadcast regularly on WGN America, EWTN, Telecare, Relevant Radio and the Word on Fire YouTube channel. Barron's Word on Fire website offers daily blogs, articles, commentaries and over ten years of weekly sermon podcasts.

In 2002, Barron was a visiting professor at the University of Notre Dame and at the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas in 2007. He was also twice scholar-in-residence at the Pontifical North American College, in 2007 and 2010.

Auxiliary Bishop of Los Angeles

On July 21, 2015, Pope Francis appointed Barron an auxiliary bishop in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and titular bishop of Macriana in Mauritania. Archbishop José Horacio Gómez noted that Barron's media talent and rapport with young people, as well as his outreach to other faiths would be good for the archdiocese. Archbishop Cupich, of Chicago, said Barron would be of great benefit to the LA archdiocese.

On September 8, 2015, Barron received his episcopal consecration at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels from Archbishop José H. Gomez. That same month, Barron started a weekly podcast called The Word on Fire Show.

Bishop of Winona–Rochester

On June 2, 2022, Pope Francis appointed Barron as the ninth bishop of the Diocese of Winona–Rochester, in southern Minnesota. His installation there took place on July 29, 2022, at the Co-Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist in Rochester, Minnesota.

Religious Liberty Commission

On May 1, 2025, it was announced the Barron would serve on the Trump Administration's newly created Religious Liberty Commission. The commission is tasked with delivering a report on the state of religious liberty in the US. The same day, other members of the panel were announced, including clerics like Cardinal Timothy Dolan.