Reading Karl Rahner

O n Ash Wednesday 1984, the day after the city of Innsbruck had celebrated the 80th birthday of Karl Rahner, S.J., I drove him on a tour that was to be the last we made together. In the neighboring town of Schwaz, we visited the Church of the Assumption, which interested him especially because of its two naves, one for the upper classes and one for the workers. At a restored Franciscan cloister he corrected me quickly when I observed a scene of “the resurrection of the dead.” “No, no,” he objected, “the resurrection of the body!” Over dinner it was clear that he paid little attention to the body’s nutritional needs, ordering only an elaborate local dessert of apple pancakes. Weeks later, back home in the United States, I grieved upon learning of his death on March 30.

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