![\"Card](\"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/Card%20Tomas%20Spidlik.jpeg\")
<\/a>What an immense gift to hear this will of God from his own\u00a0mouth! I think that the great men of faith live immersed in this grace, they\u00a0have the gift to perceive this truth with particular force, and so can also go\u00a0through harsh trials, such as those that Father Tomas Spidlik went through,\u00a0without losing confidence, and keeping, on the contrary, a lively sense of\u00a0humor, which is certainly a sign of intelligence but also of interior liberty<\/b>.<\/p>\nUnder this profile, evident was the likeness between our mourned cardinal and\u00a0the Venerable John Paul II: both were given to ingenious joking and jokes, even\u00a0though having had as youths difficult personal circumstances, similar in some\u00a0aspects. Providence made them meet and collaborate for the good of the Church,\u00a0especially so that she would learn to breathe fully “with her two\u00a0lungs,” as the Slav Pope liked to say.<\/p>\n
This liberty and presence of spirit has its objective\u00a0foundation in the Resurrection of Christ. I want to underline it because we are\u00a0in the Easter liturgical season and because it is suggested by the first and second\u00a0biblical readings of this celebration. In his first preaching, on the day of\u00a0Pentecost, St. Peter, full of the Holy Spirit, proclaims the realization in\u00a0Jesus Christ of Psalm 16.<\/p>\n
It is wonderful to see how the Holy Spirit reveals to the\u00a0Apostles all the beauty of those words in the full interior light of the\u00a0Resurrection: “I saw the Lord always before me, for he is at my right hand\u00a0that I may not be shaken; therefore my heart was glad, and my tongue rejoiced;\u00a0moreover my flesh will dwell in hope” (Acts 2:25-26; cf Psalm 16\/15:8-9).\u00a0This prayer finds superabundant fulfillment when Christ, the Holy One of God,\u00a0is not abandoned in hell. He in the first place has known “ways of\u00a0life” and has been filled with joy with the presence of the Father (cf\u00a0Acts 2:27-28; Psalm 16\/15:11).<\/p>\n
The hope and joy of the Risen Jesus are also the hope and\u00a0joy of his friends, thanks to the action of the Holy Spirit. Father Spidlik\u00a0demonstrated it habitually with his way of living, and this witness of his was\u00a0ever more eloquent with the passing of the years because, despite his advanced\u00a0age and the inevitable infirmities, his spirit remained fresh and youthful.\u00a0What is this if not friendship with the Risen Lord?<\/p>\n
In the second reading, St. Peter blesses God that “by\u00a0his great mercy we have been born anew to a living hope through the\u00a0resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” And he adds: “In this\u00a0you rejoice, though now for a little while you may have to suffer various\u00a0trials” (1 Peter 1:3.6). Here, too, is seen clearly how hope and joy are\u00a0theological realities that emanate from the mystery of the Resurrection of\u00a0Christ and from the gift of his Spirit. We could say that the Holy Spirit takes\u00a0them from the heart of the Risen Christ and infuses them in the heart of his\u00a0friends.<\/p>\n
I introduced on purpose the image of the “heart,”\u00a0because, as many of you know, Father Spidlik chose it as the motto of his\u00a0cardinal’s coat of arms: “Ex toto corde,” “with all the\u00a0heart.” This expression is found in the Book of Deuteronomy, within the\u00a0first and fundamental commandment of the law, there where Moses says to the\u00a0people: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord; and you shall love\u00a0the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all\u00a0your might” (Deuteronomy 6:4-5). “With all the heart — ex toto\u00a0corde” refers hence to the way with which Israel must love its God. Jesus confirms the primacy of this commandment, which he combines with that of love\u00a0of neighbor, affirming that the latter is “similar” to the first and that\u00a0from both the whole law and the prophets depend<\/i> (cf Matthew 22:37-39). Choosing\u00a0this motto, our venerated brother placed, so to speak, his life within the\u00a0commandment of love, he inscribed it wholly in the primacy of God and of\u00a0charity<\/b><\/i>.<\/p>\n There is another aspect, a further meaning of the expression\u00a0“ex toto corde,” that surely Father Spidlik had present and attempted\u00a0to manifest with his motto. Always starting from the Biblical root, the symbol\u00a0of the heart represents in Eastern spirituality the seat of prayer, of the\u00a0meeting between man and God, but also with other men and with the cosmos. And\u00a0here we must remember that in Cardinal Spidlik’s standard, the heart that the\u00a0coat of arms shows contains a cross in whose arms intersect the words\u00a0“phos” and “zoe” — “light” and “life”\u00a0— which are names of God. Hence, the man who fully receives, “ex toto\u00a0corde,” the love of God, receives light and life, and becomes in turn\u00a0light and life in humanity and in the universe.<\/p>\n But who is this man? Who is this “heart” of the\u00a0world, if not Jesus Christ? He is the Light and life, for in Him “the\u00a0whole fullness of deity dwells bodily” (Colossians 2:0). And I wish to\u00a0recall here that our deceased brother was a member of the Society of Jesus,\u00a0that is, a spiritual son of St. Ignatius who put in the center of faith and\u00a0spirituality the contemplation of God in the mystery of Christ.<\/p>\n In this symbol of the heart East and West meet, not in a\u00a0devotional but in a profoundly Christological sense, as other Jesuit\u00a0theologians of the last century revealed. And Christ, central figure of \u00a0Revelation, is also the formal principle of Christian art, a realm that had in\u00a0Father Spidlik a great teacher, inspirer of ideas and of expressive projects,\u00a0which found an important synthesis in the Redemptoris Mater chapel of the\u00a0Apostolic Palace.<\/p>\n I would like to conclude returning to the theme of the\u00a0Resurrection, quoting a text much loved by Cardinal Spidlik, a fragment of the\u00a0Hymns on the Resurrection of St. Ephrem the Syrian:<\/p>\n From on High He descended as Lord, May the Virgin Mother of God accompany the soul of our\u00a0venerated brother in the embrace of the Most Holy Trinity, where “with all\u00a0the heart” he will eternally praise his infinite Love. Amen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I don’t typically post the Holy Father’s funeral addresses for cardinals here because they’d be too many. But I think this is one is an exceptional circumstance with the death of His Eminence, Tomas Cardinal Spidlik who was laid to rest today. Emphasis added for important points, obviously. May Cardinal Spidlik’s memory be eternal! Among … Continue reading Benedict reflects on Tomas Spidlik, priest, Jesuit, scholar, cardinal<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[32228],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25507"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25507"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25507\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34417,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25507\/revisions\/34417"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25507"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25507"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25507"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nFrom the womb he issued as a slave,
\nDeath knelt before Him in Sheol,
\nAnd life adored Him in his resurrection.
\n“Blessed is his victory!” (No. 1:8).<\/p>\n