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Underlying the Scriptures today is the consistent message of God’s covenant which is rooted in compassion for the human experience. The deeply moving response of Jesus to his dear friend’s death shows us the power of that compassion. This is the relationship God has established with each one of us; it is irrevocable and unconditional. I will put my spirit in you that you may live. God’s covenant is life-giving.For our part, we must be willing to accept that covenant and be wholly attentive to God’s will in our lives, which is profoundly simple: to imitate in all we do and say that same covenant of love: Love one another as I have loved you. The acceptance of one another in honesty and trust is essential to living out the covenant relationship God has established with us. But as much as God’s love is life-giving, we often find ourselves bound by self-interest which cuts us off from others—and ultimately from God. Without realizing it, we find ourselves living in tombs where life is drained out of us. In the 1995 movie, Flatliners, we have a revealing narrative of just how that can happen. According to a web synopis:Medical students begin to explore the realm of near death experiences, hoping for insights. They all have their heart stopped and are revived. During those episodes, they begin having flashes of walking nightmares from their past, reflecting sins they committed or had committed against them. The experiences continue to intensify, and they begin to be physically beaten by their visions as they try to go deeper into the death experience to find a cure.Being in a healthy relationship presumes activity, and an energizing activity at that. When two people enter a relationship they do so by opening themselves up to experience one another, not just as they are at that point in time, but also in the past and into the future. This is what makes a relationship a living, dynamic organism. To deny that fundamental principle is to drain the excitement, the very life, out of a relationship. More often than not self-interest, arguably the ultimate source of sin, is the culprit. Regardless of the relationship, denying this breeds dysfunction; ignoring it breeds disrespect. The Scriptures invite a challenge to all that traps us into separating ourselves from others. As in the Lazaru story, God’s life-giving love calls us out of our lifeless tombs: “Untie him and let him go.” What binds us into lifeless relationships? Our Lenten journey leads us to just that self-examination. What we in our Catholic tradition call “An Examination of Conscience” attempts to penetrate the depths of our relationships with God, others and self. As “story-telling” people, this is one of our more uncomfortable rituals. A remarkably revealing Examination of Conscience* captures the relational character of our personal stories and underscores what traps us in lifeless tombs.In our relationship with God:denying a hunger for Goddespair and distrust disbelief in God’s love.In our relationships with others:friendships left to wither ethnic jokes that fuel racism angry words and abusive actions ignoring and even resenting the poor the little lies, the face-saving untruths And even our relationship with ourselves:our own self-pity denying our brokenness our unwillingness to forgive not believing in God’s forgiveness.The raising of Lazarus tells us not only of the power of the Christ over death, but also his power over that which entombs us and our relationships. Through the death and resurrection of Jesus, we are set free from the brokenness of those experiences that drain the life out of our relationships. Through the Eucharist we celebrate, we acknowledge the most important part of our story captured by Saint Paul in the Letter to the Romans:But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is alive because of righteousness.Because of our faith, we are Lazarus, as Christ commands: “Untie him and let him go.”