CARDINAL CARLO MARIA MARTINI, S.J. (1927-2012)
From left, the cardinal with B16 in May 2005; on his 80th birthday in Jerusalem (Feb 2007); next 2 photos taken 2009-2010 after he retired to a Jesuit home in Gallarate, near Milan; last 3 photos taken 2011-2012.
Benedict XVI mourns the death
of Cardinal Martini
August 31, 2012
Here is Vatican Radio's translation of the telegram sent by the Holy Father to Cardinal Angelo Scola, Archbishop of Milan, on the death of his predecessor as head of Europe's largest diocese:
Having heard with sadness the news of the death of Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini after a long illness, which he lived with a tranquil soul and with confident abandonment to the will of the Lord, I wish to express to you and to the entire diocesan community, as well as to the family of the late Cardinal, my profound share in their sorrow, recalling with affection this dear brother who served the Gospel and the Church so generously.
I recall with gratitude the intense and profuse Apostolic work of this zealous, spiritual child of St. Ignatius, an expert teacher, an authoritative biblical scholar, and a beloved Rector of the Pontifical Gregorian University and of the Pontifical Biblical Institute, and a wise and diligent Archbishop of the Ambrosian Archdiocese.
I think also of the competent and fervent service he gave to the Word of God, always opening to the ecclesial community the treasures of the Sacred Scriptures, especially through the promotion of Lectio Divina.
I raise fervent prayers to the Lord that, through the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, He will receive His faithful servant and worthy shepherd into the heavenly Jerusalem; and upon all those who mourn his death, I warmly impart the comfort of the Apostolic Blessing.
Cardinal Martini, a rare liberal
who was a papal contender in 2005
conclave, dies at age 85
VATICAN CITY. August 31 (AP) - Italian Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini,
a rare liberal within the highly conservative Catholic Church hierarchy who was nevertheless long considered a papal contender, has died at age 85.
Martini, former archbishop of the important archdiocese of Milan, had been battling Parkinson's disease for years. His death Friday was announced by the Milan archdiocese.
Martini frequently voiced openness to divisive issues, such as using condoms to fight AIDS or homosexuality, which, while
not at odds with Church teaching [What an understatement!], nevertheless showed his progressive bent.
He was a noted biblical scholar and, despite his liberal views, was considered
a possible contender in the 2005 conclave that brought Pope Benedict XVI to the papacy. [
'Possible contender' is far removed from the pre-Conclave hype that virtually crowned him Pope in an orgy of wishful thinking by people who did not even consider Joseph Ratzinger papabile in any way (too old, too conservative, too polarizing, the very opposite of the MSM's image of the ideal Pope'.]
He retired as archbishop in 2002 and moved to Jerusalem, but returned to Italy in 2008 as his Parkinson's worsened.
It makes the death of a major personality doubly saddening when someone who was for the better part of three decades the hero of the liberal MSM - because he was a major figure in the Church hierarchy who articulated many liberal viewpoints advocated by the MSM themselves - gets nothing better than the brief and uninformative obituary above by the epitome of MSM today, the Associated Press, no less. Reuters had a slightly longer report....
Former papal candidate
Milan archbishop Martini,
dies at 85
ROME, August 31 (Reuters) - Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, former archbishop of Milan and a favorite of Vatican progressives to succeed Pope John Paul II in 2005, died on Friday aged 85, the Milan diocese said on its website.
In a letter marking Martini's death, Pope Benedict remembered him as a "skilful teacher and preeminent biblical scholar," and recalled his dedication to Christian works.
Martini retired because of his age in 2002 after 22 years as head of the diocese, revealing at the same time that he was suffering from a form of Parkinson's disease, which hurt his chances of becoming Pope three years later.
A Jesuit intellectual, Martini was reported to speak 11 languages. But his liberal opinions sometimes raised the hackles of Church conservatives.
He once told an interviewer that even issues as controversial as birth control and women priests could be seen in a different light in the future.
"Certainly the use of condoms in particular situations can constitute a lesser evil," Martini said in an interview with the Italian magazine l'Espresso in 2006.
"There is the particular situation of married couples in which one of the spouses is affected by AIDS. This person has an obligation to protect the other partner and the other partner also has to protect him or herself."
The Catholic Church, which runs many hospitals and institutions to help AIDS victims, opposes the use of condoms and teaches that fidelity within heterosexual marriage, chastity and abstinence are the best way to stop the spread of HIV/AIDS.
It says promoting condoms to fight the spread of AIDS fosters what it sees as immoral and hedonistic lifestyles and behavior that will only contribute to its spread.
Martini remained a prominent voice in the Church, and in May spoke out about the leaks scandal that led to the arrest of Pope Benedict's butler. Martini appealed to Church leaders to "urgently win back the trust of the faithful" after the scandal.
[Perhaps this thought needed to be articulated in the open, but surely, Pope Benedict and those of his collaborators at the Vatican who are both faithful to the Pope as well as blameless in the Vatileaks mess, did not need to be reminded about that!]
After he retired from the Milan post, he spent about six years in Jerusalem, returning to his first love - Biblical studies.
After he lost the ability to swallow around two weeks ago, Martini refused to be fed artificially, his neurologist Gianni Pezzoli said.
"We saw the inexorable consequences of his affliction, which progressively robbed him of speech, reducing it to a whisper that was barely audible, and of his movement," said an article published on the Milan diocese's website.
How emblematic that the obituaries by the two leading news agencies in the world have focused only on the two aspects of Cardinal Martini that have ever interested them - that he was the liberal candidate for Pope in 2005, and his more controversial liberal views. Hardly a word for his larger career which, after all, saw him Rector of the Pontifical Gregorian University and 22 years as Archbishop of Milan, not to mention, author of many books. (BTW, AP is starting a new MSM myth, and ignoring the MSM's own reporting history, by claiming that Cardinal Martini was the 'rare liberal' who was a papal contender. Before him, for two Conclaves, there was the formidable Cardinal Benelli of Florence, who was the leading liberal candidate in the twp conclaves of 1987 = when both times, the cardinal electors agreed instead on a 'consensus moderate', first, Albino Luciani, and then, after his unexpected death, Karol Wojtyla.]
Anyway, as much as I held an active resentment against Cardinal Martini - or perhaps, not so much him as his acolytes in the media - for quite a few statements that he made since 2005 that were quickly touted by the MSM as nothing less than the counter-Magisterium from 'the anti-Pope to Benedict XVI', I drew something from Benedict XVI's own example to consider the cardinal more charitably and even sympathetically, especially in recent years, as his condition worsened. And so, not too long ago, I posted what has amounted to be his last public statement when he decided to end a twice-monthly column he had been contributing to Corriere della Sera...
'Dialog with the heart defies time:
My three happy years as a columnist with Corriere'
by Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini
Translated from
June 24, 2012
The time has come when age and illness are giving me a clear signal that it is the time to retire from the greater part of earthly concerns in order to prepare for the imminent coming of the Kingdom.
I assure my prayers for all those whose questions have remained unanswered in this column that I have held for three years in Corriere. Dialog with the heart defies time.
I wish to start the last page of this column to thank all those who have written me in these years. I have received thousands of letters of affection, of gratitude, of encouragement, and of criticism.
I ask forgiveness from those whom I was not able to answer and from those who, though receiving an acknowledgment of their questions, have considered the answer barely exhaustive or not at all.
I thank the editor of Corriere who has allowed me this time of dialog despite the fact that my voice has weakened, and I thank all his co-workers.
Thanks from the heart also to my successors on the Chair of St, Ambrose for the patience that they have shown during these monthly interventions.
Now the time has come to retire. May Jesus respond to the most profound questions in the heart of everyone.
He proceeds to answer the letter he has chosen:
The greatest sorrow
is to lose a young child
Dear Cardinal Martini, On Monday, April 2, I lost my 10-year-old son. I humbly ask you for a word of comfort and the way to follows so that somehow I can bo back to living. How, Eminence, can I believe in Jesus? I beg you, Eminence, help me, you who are a special man. - Francesco Rizzo
Dear Francesco, there are really no words of comfort before a sorrow that is so great, perhaps the greatest sorrow for a human being. Nor can I show you the right ways exactly. I can tell you that I pray for you in order that Jesus himself, Son of God, may show you the way. It certainly will not come right away, because such great sorrows take away our strength, our sight and our hearing, and even harm our fundamental strength to have the courage to face any event.
I have not been able to get the last part of the column, but a writer who reported on Cardinal Martini's farewell to his Corriere readers, writes this about it:
The emeritus Archbishop of Milan also answers a reader who asks him what is happening in the Church. Citing the Gospel of Matthew, the Cardinal assures the reader - and the Pope - that "the gates of Hell shall not prevail".
It is the second time in a few weeks that Cardinal Martini, often portrayed as an antagonist of Benedict XVI, has given his explicit and affectionate support for the Pontiff.
[The first was after their brief meeting at the Archbishop's Palace in Milan when the Pope was there for the VII World Meeting of Families. Before that, they met in the Vatican on April 4, 2011, at the time the Pope was deciding on who would be the next Archbishop of Milan..]
Cardinal Martini has been suffering from Parkinson's disease since 2002 - he announced he had the first signs of the disease shortly before retiring at age 75 as Archbishop of Milan. It has now advanced to the point where he has difficulty moving and talking. In 2008, he wrote an essay saying he felt that death was imminent, but apparently, the Lord did not think so. In 2010, he wrote a beautiful essay on how he has been coping with his ailment, and revealed how, spiritually, he relies on the well-known Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola, but that he discovered it was the music of Mozart that helps him best, not just to counteract depression with joy, but also to accompany the necessary exercises to keep him physically moving. I will translate it when I can... I think it might have been a small shock to Benedict XVI earlier this month to observe the difference that a year could make (since their April 2011 meeting), and I am sure he has Cardinal Martini in his prayers every day. Let us pray for him, too.
9/2/12
P.S. Alas, I spoke too soon. It turns out the cardinal had enough reserve energy - and motivation, obviously - to grant a last interview some time in August, at any rate a few weeks before he died - which Corriere della Sera has now published. In which the apparently quintessential Carlo Maria Martini emerges without ifs or buts, assailing the Church as 200 years behind the times, and saying everyone in it, starting with the Pope, needs urgent cleansing. Dear Cardinal, did you choose not to read at all anything that has been happening in the Church since Benedict XVI became Pope? Anyway, more below in the corresponding post on the CdS posthumous 'scoop'.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 03/09/2012 20:12]