For many, the last waiting room opens onto darkness alone. Carlo Maria Martini believed that once he crossed the threshold of that "hard passage," he would encounter the fullness of truth. Yet he never hesitated to admit his fear—profoundly human—in the face of such a difficult crossing.
"You see," he said, "I find myself reflecting in the context of imminent death. I have already arrived in the last waiting room, or nearly the last." He had announced this on October 2, 2008, speaking before a thousand people gathered in San Fedele in Milan to hear his presentation of a book about Paul VI as a spiritual man. His voice had already grown thin. But his blue eyes still shone as ever—transparent, revealing an immense inner strength.
The man of unshakeable faith was afraid. Like everyone. Like the most fragile among the fragile. A man, among others. He who always appeared so serene, so certain.
Martini never hesitated to reveal the suffering that afflicted him. He had before him a great master: John Paul II. The Pope pounded his fist on the table when he could no longer speak. The Jesuit who became archbishop revealed his difficulties without bitterness. But he did not hide them.
He accepted first the cane, then the wheelchair, then the amplifier for his voice. A man who had placed his faith in the Word, who had entrusted his teaching to speech itself—now he could no longer communicate. A difficult penance. Yet faith taught him to look beyond. Here lies Martini's final lesson: in his gaze upon suffering. He, whom many regarded as hieratic, almost haughty, was a shy and deeply sensitive man.
It is hard to write of him without the flood of personal memory.
The most beautiful remains his greeting to people with intellectual disabilities from the Fede e Luce communities who gathered at the archbishop's residence to say goodbye before he left the diocese at the end of 2002. His blue eyes filled with tears as he took the hand of some of them in prayer—a prayer that became a dance. Emotion overwhelmed him. There was no restraint for him in the presence of those who grasped the meaning of those tears.
Now that so many mourn his passing, Martini lives on in that capacity to listen to the heart of anyone: believer or nonbeliever, saint or extremist, powerful statesman or person made fragile by various forms of suffering. His authoritative voice—which many of us heard perhaps sitting on the cold floor of the Cathedral, at the School of the Word, in dozens of encounters—will guide us no longer. But his writings abound. Anyone wishing to undertake a journey of discovery through faith, dialogue, and ecumenism would have much to read. His teaching will not be lost. Now grief is universal. It would be beautiful if everyone—truly everyone—could grasp the lessons of that faith which drew on the Word of Scripture, yes, but also on the concrete reality of a changing world. A world in which every age leaves its mark.
Angela Grassi, 2012
from La Prealpina – September 1, 2012