Death of Cardinal Stickler

Last evening Cardinal Alfons Maria Stickler died. A Salesian from Austria, he taught Latin at the UPS when it was still the PAS. In fact, he was the rector of the atheneum when it was upgraded by Paul VI to the status of University. After serving as rector magnificus of the UPS, he became librarian and archivist of the Vatican Library (1966), and was appointed archbishop in 1983 and created cardinal in 1985. He was born in 1910, and this year celebrated 70 years of priesthood… He died yesterday at age 97.

The pope sent a telegram of condolences to Fr Pascual Chávez Villanueva, Salesian rector major. The Vatican information service published the text of the telegram. Benedict XVI called Cardinal Stickler a "sincere and strenuous collaborator of the Holy See" who, in every circumstance, offered "a well-appreciated witness of fervant fidelity to Christ and to the Church," as well as a precious "cultural and ecclesial contribution."

Alfons Stickler, the third Salesian cardinal to die this year, after Cardinal Javiere and Cardinal Castillo y Lara. Interestingly enough, at the end of the 1980s and through the 1990s, these three cardinals shared an apartment in Rome as their residence. All three worked in the curia of John Paul II, but all three desired to continue to live in a Salesian community. As it became impractical for them to live in one of the regular houses of the Roman province, or at the UPS, they had their own Salesian community, the three of them, on a side street close to the Vatican. On the doorbell they had their surnames printed simply: "Stickler, Castillo, Javiere" (I remember seeing the building and the doorbell when I was a student here). It was an example to me that they all three wanted to continue to live the family spirit of Don Bosco even though, as bishops, they were no longer legally bound to the Salesian Society. Powerful witness this was.