I came across this item today about the sale of an original seventh century gospel of St. John to the British Museum, in partnership with Durham University and Durham Cathedral. It was buried with Saint Cuthbert in about 698.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-17732310

Cuthbert, who evangelized much of what is now northern England and parts of southern Scotland, was very highly venerated, perhaps more so than any other saint before Thomas Becket.

Here is a photograph of the book in its actual size to the scale of a human hand.

http://www.dur.ac.uk/news/newsitem/?itemno=14360

I won’t write in detail here about the saint’s life. That is easy enough to look up on the Web.

What I will point out is that Cuthbert’s faith in God was so dynamic that the effects of his holy life are still apparent in the 21st century. They ripple out through the wastes of time and circumstance to be manifested even in this age of crippled fidelity.

From its appearance in photographs the book is astonishingly well preserved. And as Cuthbert’s body was seen to be incorruptible when it was exhumed, so does the living body of faith go on,

spreading about it the odor of sanctity in this corrupted and malodorous age. The evangelizer of a pagan Britain may have something to teach us these days.

By the way, Saint Cuthbert was known to be a lover of animals, perhaps in some way a British Saint Francis. This makes him especially endearing to me.