Dear friends,

On this time of great sadness over the call to Heaven of our fraternal friend Professor David L. Schindler last November 16, I express on behalf of the entire Movement my most heartfelt sympathy to his children, family members and all of you.

Many know David for his academic work, the result of friendship and intense and passionate dialogue with figures such as Von Balthasar, Ratzinger, John Paul II and Fr. Giussani. As first editor of the journal Communio. International Catholic Review, he was among the greatest North American Catholic theologians of our time. His heart was moved by the memory of God who “is related to everything, is at the heart of everything, at all times,” as he often repeated.

After being appointed as Full Professor at Notre Dame University, he left this prestigious University to teach at the new John Paul II Institute for Marriage and Family in Washington, DC. He found in John Paul II and the various authors close to him that perception of Being as gift and love that constitutes the nature of God, man and history. His service to the Church was also expressed in the education of hundreds of people who, through his lectures, discovered the truth and depth of faith. Many of them were converted.

David felt extremely close to Fr. Giussani. He frequently met with him. He helped us introduce The Religious Sense and The Risk of Education, both by organizing conferences in Washington DC and by presenting the first volume of the path to the United Nations in New York in 1997. He was a great friend of Memores Domini and the Fraternity of St. Charles Borromeo and shared their journey in multiple ways. He reminded us that “life is a gift, and, with God’s grace, it is necessary to give one’s life definitively and totally to God” for the happiness of people and the fruitfulness of the Church.

We are infinitely grateful for his friendship and for his vivid testimony of the path to holiness to which we are all called, and I join your prayers that Our Lady intercede for him with the Lord, who will receive him into His Glory.

Davide Prosperi