Shared in the diocesan e-newsletter, Thursday 19 March

At Oscott College we have a small chapel dedicated to St Thomas of Canterbury which visitors to the College rarely see. In this chapel there are four beautiful medieval panels depicting scenes from the Gospel. One of them shows the Gospel for this Sunday: the raising of Jesus’ friend, Lazarus, from the dead. The painting shows Lazarus being stripped of his burial cloths and looking grey and gaunt – he clearly had been dead.  

As if underlining the point, the people around the scene are scrunching their noses or covering their faces. There must have been a strong smell of decay and death. And yet Lazarus is alive. When the stone was rolled away from the tomb, he heard the voice of Jesus say to him, ‘Lazarus, come out.’
 
We can sometimes create for ourselves a kind of living tomb: place where sin, shame, fear or hurt persuade to hide away from others. This can rob us from living the fullness of life that Jesus wants for us. Into those closed and darken places, Jesus calls out to us by name: ‘Come out.’  We do not need to be ruled by fear or by what others might think. The Lord is calling you to life. ‘Come out!’

Fr Michael Glover
St Mary's College, Oscott

The Sunday Gospels of Lent

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