Bishop Robert Barron, Tucker Carlson talk rise of evil and hope of revival

By Jon Brown, Christian Post Reporter Tuesday, June 03, 2025

Hope of revival: ‘You can’t hide from God all day’

Despite the rise of evil in the world, Barron is optimistic that a Christian revival is taking place.

"What I think, Tucker, what is really interesting is the fact that religion is experiencing a revival, even as we speak," Barron said, to which Carlson replied, "You feel that?"

"Oh yeah, I can measure it; it's been measured statistically. Because you can't hide from God all day."

According to a new study as part of Barna's State of the Church 2025 initiative, commitment to Jesus has risen sharply among young men especially, jumping 15 percentage points between 2019 and 2025 among Gen Z men, and 19 percentage points among millennials.

Barron noted that God invites mankind to fellowship with Him in the space between hiding from Him in secularism and fruitlessly grasping for Him through idolatry.

"He's transcendent, I can't grasp Him; and He's also immanent, I can't hide from Him, see?" Barron said. "And that's the space opened up by the Bible, I think. So what's the solution, you might ask? The solution is fall in love with God. Falling in love is not grasping, it's not hiding from. And can we read the Bible as God trying to draw His people into that space."

He offered the story of Elijah and the prophets of Baal in 1 Kings 18, who ended up cutting themselves in a futile attempt to invoke their false gods, which Barron likened to the inevitable self-destruction of all idolatry.

"Now think of someone addicted to power, sex, money, pleasure, whatever it is, and I'm begging you will satisfy me," he said. "It won't because it can't, and I'll end up harming myself."

"Then Elijah calls upon the true God, the fire comes as a surprise, it takes the sacrifice. It's not just a jingoistic story; it's a very powerful story that the true God is the only one that can satisfy the longing of the heart."

Related: What is Christian revival?