SouthernWorldwide.com – Bishop Robert Barron, a prominent figure in the Catholic Church and founder of Word On Fire Ministries, has voiced strong criticism against politicians he labels as “borderline communists,” specifically mentioning Senator Bernie Sanders and Mayor Zohran Mamdani, ahead of his participation in President Donald Trump’s upcoming prayer event.
Barron, who leads the Catholic Diocese of Winona-Rochester, Minnesota, is scheduled to deliver an address at President Donald Trump’s “Rededicate 250” prayer event on the National Mall this weekend. Beyond his high-ranking position within the Catholic Church, Barron is widely recognized for his outspoken defense of Christianity and Western civilization on social media.
In January, Barron publicly criticized New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani for his inaugural speech, where Mamdani praised the “warmth of collectivism.” Barron expressed his exasperation on X, stating, “for God’s sake, spare me.”
He further elaborated on his critique of collectivist economic systems, stating, “Capitalism, like all economic systems, is going to be flawed because it’s made up of flawed human beings, but the economy that kills? Socialism is responsible for the deaths of hundreds of millions of people.” He added that “collectivism has been such a disastrous concept.”
Barron emphasized that his opposition to socialism stems directly from his Catholic faith, highlighting that the Church’s social teachings unequivocally condemn the ideology.
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He admitted to being surprised by the significant leftward shift within the Democratic Party in recent years, which he believes is evident in the increasing acceptance of socialist candidates like Mamdani.
“We have a two-party system. If one of our two parties has gone that far to the left where explicit socialists, even, I would say, borderline communists, are being proposed as serious candidates, I think we’ve got a problem in our body politic,” Barron stated.
As a bishop, Barron expressed concern over the rise of figures such as Senator Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont who caucuses with the Democrats. Barron noted that what was once considered an isolated viewpoint has become increasingly normalized among new party members.
“When Bernie Sanders first emerged … I thought, ‘Well, he’ll never go anywhere.’ But of course, he was quite successful,” Barron recalled. “But to go from let’s say Bill Clinton style Democratic Party to Bernie Sanders, that’s a pretty big shift in a relatively short time.”
Instead of remaining silent, Barron urged Christians to actively engage in the public square rather than retreating into private life. He called for them to “stand to thwart socialism.”
“There are forces that want us to withdraw into privacy, to be on the margins of society. [But] it’s especially now that the religious, I think, have to assert themselves in the public square,” he asserted.
For Barron, this public assertion involves “talking about the faith publicly and with confidence and with panache.”
He further explained that it means “entering into dialogue and debate. It means living out your faith in a public manner. It means getting into university culture and getting into the institutions of our country in a way that’s not aggressive, but at the same time not apologetic.”
Barron highlighted that bringing faith into the public sphere is an “unrealized dream” of the Catholic Church’s Second Vatican Council.
“What we have to fight for is a democratic civilization predicated upon objective moral value and finally upon God who presides over the very freedom that we exercise,” he concluded. “Fight for that culture in entertainment and in politics and in communication and in every aspect of life. That is a cultural war worth fighting.”
