Reflection on the Readings for the Fifth Sunday of Lent

I went down into the countries underneath the earth, to the peoples of the past. But you lifted my life from the pit, Yahweh, my God.
(Jonah 2:7, The Jerusalem Bible (1966), English Translation, J.R.R. Tolkien)

The prayer of Jonah from the belly of a whale symbolizes Israel’s state of desolation, crying out to God in exile. More…