Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe, O.P.

Summary

The Spiritual Life with Fr. James Martin, S.J.

Episode: Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe, O.P.
Release Date: June 17, 2025

---

Introduction

In the inaugural episode of The Spiritual Life with Fr. James Martin, S.J., Father Jim Martin welcomes listeners to explore the depths of spiritual experiences in daily life and prayer. Accompanied by his producer, Maggie Van Dorn, Father Martin sets the tone for an engaging and profound conversation aimed at delving beyond superficial aspects of spirituality.

Guest Introduction: Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe, O.P.

Father Martin introduces Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe, a distinguished English Dominican priest and former Master General of the Dominican Order. Cardinal Radcliffe is renowned for his theological contributions and his role as a spiritual director during the Synod on Synodality. Notably, he participated in the conclave that elected Pope Leo XIV and has authored several influential books, including Listening, Meditations on Synodality and Surprised by Further Meditations on Synodality.

Understanding Synod on Synodality

The Synod on Synodality is described as a multi-year gathering of Catholic leaders worldwide, aiming to foster a more inclusive and listening Church. Father Martin notes, "Cardinal Radcliffe was one of our spiritual directors, our retreat directors" (02:22). The synod emphasized unity and the importance of friendship within the Church, themes that Cardinal Radcliffe explores in his writings and discussions.

Dominican Spirituality: The Essence of Friendship

Cardinal Radcliffe elucidates the core of Dominican spirituality, highlighting the paramount importance of friendship. He states, "friendship lifts into equality" (15:28), drawing parallels between divine and human friendships. This foundation fosters genuine dialogue and understanding within the Church, allowing for authentic connections that transcend theological differences.

Father Martin adds, referencing Father Bill Barry, "Everything that you could say about a good friendship, you can say about your relationship with God" (14:40). This analogy underscores the relational aspect of prayer and spirituality, emphasizing honesty, listening, and presence.

Prayer: Building a Relationship with God

When addressing the purpose of prayer, Father Martin emphasizes relationship over mere obedience: "One of the main reasons for prayer is to develop a relationship with God" (04:24). He echoes Father Barry's sentiment that prayer is akin to friendship, requiring time, honesty, and attentive listening.

Cardinal Radcliffe echoes this by describing prayer as "talking to God as to a friend" (12:26). He highlights the significance of being present and enjoying God's company, much like one would with a close friend.

Vulnerability and Spiritual Growth through Illness

A pivotal moment in the conversation revolves around Cardinal Radcliffe's personal experience with a severe illness. After undergoing a 17-hour operation for mouth cancer, Radcliffe shares how this ordeal deepened his understanding of vulnerability in prayer. He reflects, "I was just like everybody else... no, you've never felt sorry for yourself" (28:13). This humbling experience reinforced that God's love does not depend on personal merit or achievements.

Father Martin relates by discussing common struggles in prayer, such as the expectation of profound experiences. He notes, "If you pray for more than about three minutes a day, you're fooling yourself" (16:21), emphasizing that even minimal, sincere prayer can be transformative.

Friendship as a Bridge in a Polarized Church

The dialogue progresses to the role of friendship in bridging divides within the Church and the broader world. Cardinal Radcliffe asserts, "Friendship brings you down to earth. It's incarnational" (42:56), advocating for genuine connections that respect individual differences. He encourages asking meaningful questions to understand diverse perspectives, fostering an environment where dialogue can thrive despite varying theological viewpoints.

Insights from the Synod: The Net Metaphor

One of the episode's standout moments is the discussion of the "Net" metaphor introduced during the synod retreats. Cardinal Radcliffe explains, "It's not because he's strong. It's because the attractiveness of the Lord who draws all things to himself when he's lifted up" (46:50). This image illustrates how divine attraction, rather than sheer force, enables the Church to unite and expand its reach, much like the miraculous catch of fish in the Biblical narrative.

Living in the Present: Embracing Playfulness and Humility

Both Father Martin and Cardinal Radcliffe emphasize the importance of living in the present and embracing humility. Radcliffe shares, "The older I get, the more I think, gosh, conversation should be playful" (38:32), highlighting the liberating effect of dropping serious facades in favor of genuine, joyous interactions.

Father Martin concurs, sharing a personal anecdote where humor helped him realize he was taking himself too seriously. This mutual appreciation for playfulness and humility serves as a model for listeners to engage more authentically in their spiritual and daily lives.

Conclusion: Embracing Vulnerability and Hope

As the conversation concludes, both hosts reflect on Cardinal Radcliffe's resilience and joyful spirit despite ongoing health challenges. Father Martin encourages listeners to embrace a balance of vulnerability and hope, inspired by Radcliffe's example of finding joy in daily moments, such as "talking with Maggie and Jim" (50:36).

The episode wraps up with a heartfelt appreciation for Cardinal Radcliffe's insights and contributions, urging listeners to engage with his writings and teachings to further their spiritual journeys.

---

Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• Father Jim Martin:

  • "It's a way to look at people's spiritual lives in their daily life and in their prayer." (00:59)

• Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe:

  • "Friendship is always very concrete. You don't have friends in abstract, you have particular friends." (41:49)
  • "The attractiveness of the Lord who draws all things to himself." (46:50)
  • "If you have a friend and they keep ringing you... you'd wonder what the friendship was." (47:59)
  • "God is not a controller as much as one who walks somehow in the depths, the interior depths of our lives." (23:05)
  • "Friendship always brings you down to earth. It's incarnational." (42:56)

• Father Bill Barry (Referenced by Father Martin):

  • "Good friends can sometimes be silent with one another." (14:40)

---

Key Takeaways

1. Friendship at the Core: Both divine and human friendships are foundational to deepening one's spiritual life and fostering genuine dialogue within the Church.

2. Prayer as Relationship: Prayer is not merely a means to an end but a way to cultivate an authentic relationship with God, emphasizing honesty, listening, and presence.

3. Embracing Vulnerability: Personal experiences of vulnerability, such as illness, can lead to profound spiritual growth and a deeper understanding of God's love and presence.

4. Balancing Ties and Space: Effective dialogue and community within the Church require both strong connections (ties) and respect for individuality (space), akin to the "Net" metaphor used during the synod.

5. Living in the Present with Humility: Embracing playfulness and humility allows for more authentic interactions and a more profound spiritual life.

---

Further Engagement

Listeners are encouraged to explore Cardinal Radcliffe's books, such as Listening Together and his retreat talks available on the Vatican News YouTube channel. Engaging with these resources can provide deeper insights into the themes discussed in this episode.

For those inspired to delve deeper into their own spiritual journeys, Father Martin offers spiritual advice through listener questions, emphasizing the importance of developing a personal relationship with God over merely seeking divine approval.

---

Note: This summary excludes advertisements, intros, outros, and non-content sections to focus solely on the substantive discussions and insights shared during the episode.

Transcript

[Catholic Healthcare]

Body, mind and spirit. We believe if one needs help, so do the others. As part of Catholic Healthcare's holistic approach to treating the whole person. Here, people are not viewed as symptoms or insurance claims. And when we treat the body, mind and spirit, we believe the whole person will thrive. Catholic Healthcare. Learn more at wecareyouflourish.org Sponsored by the Catholic Health Association.

[Father Jim Martin]

Welcome to the Spiritual Life. I'm Father Jim Martin. On this podcast, we reflect on how people experience God in their prayer and in their daily lives. And I am joined by my wonderful producer, Maggie Van Dorn. Maggie, good to be with you.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

So good to be with you. Jim, on our very first episode of the Spiritual Life, did you ever think we'd get here?

[Father Jim Martin]

I had faith. I knew. I knew we would eventually get here.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

How would you describe what this ambitious podcast is about?

[Father Jim Martin]

Well, as I said, it really is a way to look at people's spiritual lives in their daily life and in their prayer. That's kind of the two ways you find God. And we have some really interesting people, some people that are pretty well known, people that are practitioners and scholars and good spiritual directors. And what I really wanted to do was kind of go deeper than a lot of places you would see online to not settle for just kind of superficial, to talk about not only the joys and consolations of the spiritual life, which are many, but the challenges and the struggles. And also my hope is that when people listen to our guests, famous or not so famous, they can take away something for their own spiritual lives. So I'm really excited about it.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Yeah. And who do we have on this very first episode?

[Father Jim Martin]

We have Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe, who is just one of my favorite people, and I think people are going to love listening to him.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

And you met him at the Synod on C, is that right?

[Father Jim Martin]

Well, I did. I knew him a little bit beforehand. I was, you know, familiar with his writings, and I think I met him once or twice, but it was really at the Synod on C, where we spent October 2023 together and October 2024 together. And I got to know him and just, he's just, he's an amazing person. I really think he's a spiritual master.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

And for those who might not be following the synod on Synodality as closely as we all have been here at America, how would you briefly describe it?

[Father Jim Martin]

Yeah, so it was a multi year meeting of Catholic leaders from around the world. It sought to listen from all these different parishes and dioceses. And we got together for two sessions in 2023 and 2024. And basically, it was a way to help the Church be more inclusive, welcoming and listening. And Cardinal Radcliffe was one of our spiritual directors, our retreat directors, as it were. And he has these two great books out which incorporate a lot of his retreat notes, which were just superb. So I'm really happy he's our very first guest.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Yeah, what better way to open a podcast than with the retreat director from the Synod on Synodality? So a few other things you should know about Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe. He's an Englishman and Dominican priest. He's a distinguished theologian, although I think he prefers the term thinker in the Thomistic tradition. He is a former Master General of the Dominican order, and he was in the conclave that elected Pope Leo XIV. He was one of those 133 voting cardinals. This is also a point in which we should really timestamp the conversation to let our audience know that this conversation with Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe was recorded a little before Pope Francis's death and the Conclave. Cardinal Radcliffe has authored numerous books on faith, spirituality and the role of the Church in the modern world, including his most recent books on Listening, Meditations on Synodality, and Surprised by Further Meditations on Cidality.

[Father Jim Martin]

Yeah, and those two books, very briefly, the first one is the first series of retreat notes, and that really helped me and so many people because it was about overcoming differences when we discuss things with one another and becoming friends as a kind of preliminary before we discuss hard topics. And the second one, his second series of retreat notes, was centered around the resurrection. So they're really very good books. You don't have to be a Synod delegate to appreciate them. And also published by one of our sponsors, Liturgical Press.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Oh, very cool. So one of the things that we're doing here on the Spiritual Life is kind of like a dear abbey of the soul. We invite listeners to write in with questions about prayer, their spiritual life, areas that might be challenging or where you're struggling. And then Jim offers some great spiritual advice. So this question comes from Pam, and she asks, what is the reason for prayer if we want God's will?

[Father Jim Martin]

Well, I hope this is great spiritual advice. It's a high bar, Maggie. But first of all, thanks, Pam, for that question. And it's a great question. You know, I think we all want to do God's will. I hope everybody on this podcast wants to do God's will. So you might say, well, then what's the point? Well, one point would be to discern God's will. So looking around to see signs of God's presence in your life and maybe indications through your prayer or your daily life of what God might be inviting you to do. Right. That's a whole topic about discernment. But I would say that one of the main reasons for prayer is to develop a relationship with God. So it's not simply about doing God's will. It's coming to know God. And one of the best insights on that comes from Father Bill Barry, who was a Jesuit priest and great spiritual master. And in his book God and You'd, he talked about comparing our relationship with God to a relationship with a friend. And so any friendship requires time. Right. You have to spend time with someone to become good friends. It requires honesty. I think that's a really important part of the spiritual life, being honest in prayer. It requires listening. That doesn't mean literally hearing God's voice orally, but, you know, where is God in your prayer and in your daily life? And so over the course of your life, the more time you spend with God, the more time you spend listening with God, the more you are honest with God, the deeper your relationship becomes. So it's not simply about doing God's will, which is super important, obviously. It's also about developing that relationship, that friendship. And for me, that's one of the foundational parts of the spiritual life, friendship with God. And we'll be talking a lot about that in our podcast episodes.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Yeah, and I love that example of friendship because as you've pointed out to me before, a friend can know how you're doing, and yet a good friend is still going to ask, how are you doing?

[Father Jim Martin]

Yeah. It's like if you're going out with someone who's lost a loved one. Right. Who's lost a loved one to death, you obviously know that they're sad, but you're going to ask anyway. And I think God obviously knows what we're going through. God is God, after all. But that's about sort of growing in intimacy and also becoming comfortable yourself with being honest with God, because a lot of people feel like there's topics that are off limits. So I think in addition to doing God's will, very important, we want intimacy with God. And that's a really important reason for prayer. But thank you, Pam, for that great and very common question.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

And if you would like to ask Father Jim a question, you can write to [e-mail] and now a word from.

[Father Jim Martin]

One of our sponsors. Looking for a simple way to deepen your own spiritual life? Give us this day is A great resource that helps Catholics stay rooted in scripture and in prayer wherever you are, no matter how busy you are. It features both reliable and relatable spiritual reflections and prayers to accompany you throughout the day. And I'm really honored to be an editorial advisor. I've been one since the very beginning. And I write a monthly essay called Teach Us to Pray about prayer. And I use Give us this Day every single day. It's a great resource and here's a great offer. Right now, listeners of the Spiritual Life can get 10% off their new print subscription. It's online, by the way, as well. Just visit giveusthisday.org spiritual life and join this community of Catholics praying together again. That's giveusthisday.org spiritual life. And now onto our conversation with Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe. Well, Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe, welcome to the Spiritual Life.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I'm delighted to be with you, Jim.

[Father Jim Martin]

Yes, I, I will call you Timothy and you can call me Jim, even if some of our listeners might be offended. I'm not saying your Eminence every five seconds.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I hope so. Nobody ever says your Eminence more than once.

[Father Jim Martin]

How are you these days?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I. Fine. I find a little bit knackered traveling around, but. But happy are you.

[Father Jim Martin]

You're finding yourself more in demand these days as a cardinal.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

The worst thing is the emails. The emails have quadrupled.

[Father Jim Martin]

Really?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

During the synod, I was having to get up at 4am just to answer the emails.

[Father Jim Martin]

Oh my gosh.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

And now, no, like 5:30 is my normal time.

[Father Jim Martin]

That's very, that's still very ascetical, I think.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Well, I know you Jesuits like to lie in bed, you know, I wish.

[Father Jim Martin]

One of the things I wanted to ask, I've always been curious about this. So what, what does it mean to have. You're the former Master General of the Dominicans. For those who don't know, that's the superior general. What would it mean to have a Dominican spirituality? I'm sure you got that question quite a bit.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Not so often. It's interesting. If you go to a bookshop, you will see lots of books on Jesuit spirituality, Carmelite spirituality, maybe Franciscan. But you won't see many books on Dominican spirituality. And that's partly because the idea of a separate thing called spirituality came into existence after our foundation.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

And Timothy, just for our audience who might not even be familiar with the Dominican order, would you just say something briefly about your foundation?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Well, St. Dominic founded the order in about 1216, and we arrived in Oxford in 1221. And I think generally in those days Dominicans didn't think that there was spirituality, ethics, biblical study, theology, philosophy. There was really just Christian living. Our big stress is on the unity of the body, the mind and the heart. And so everything really involved all of those. Well, we were always told, don't call Aquinas a theologian, he's a thinker, he's a Christian thinker. And so the task, I'd say, of what you might call Dominican spirituality is basically to come alive. And I would say that at the heart of that from the beginning is the whole idea of friendship. Aquinas said that the Christian is somebody who shares in the friendship of God, the friendship of the Trinity. And I'd say friendship is always been a very key part of our tradition. St. Dominic obviously enjoyed the company of women of his sisters more than of men. So I'd say part of what we would now call the Dominican spirituality will be the whole idea of friendship.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

And you entertain a friendship with a Jesuit?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Well, you know, we're broad minded.

[Father Jim Martin]

Very open minded. Now, for those who might not know, you know, religious order is a group of people who live in community. They profess vows of poverty, chastity and obedience. And the Dominicans have women Dominicans. There are no women Jesuits, unfortunately. I'm fascinated by that idea of Dominican spirituality as friendship. How does that influence your own prayer? Would you say, is there a Dominican way of praying?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Gosh, I could talk about that for a long time.

[Father Jim Martin]

Feel free.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I'd say the first thing is we'd say the prayer is talking to God as to a friend. And sometimes, you know, with friends, the most wonderful thing is just to be with them. What I love about when I go see my friends, my closest friends, is I don't go saying, what am I going to talk about? The aim is just to be with them, to be in their presence, to enjoy their company. I think sitting on a bench is a great act of friendship with somebody you're close to. And so I think the day begins simply with being consciously in the presence of God. Four times in Mass we say, the Lord be with you. And I think that's not just a physical presence, it's that being with which is the heart of any friendship. Silence is obviously a part of that. And it was really one of my co novices who's called David, he taught me the essence of silence because he was an immensely contemplative person. We'd go on holiday together and David would have a good hour and a half of silence with the Lord at the beginning of the day, a Bit much for me. I was delighted when we had Kindle, so I could switch from the breviary to a novel without anybody knowing. But the other thing, of course, is that we gather in the church three times a day, which I think is not the Jesuit tradition, is it correct? And it's like the breathing of the community because you sing side to side. One side sings a verse of the psalms, then another side sings. And so you. You breathe together in and out. And I think the singing of the office binds us together in a deep way.

[Father Jim Martin]

You know, Timothy, you're reminding me very much of one of my favorite spiritual writers who you may have known, or of Father Bill Barry. William Barry.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I'd heard of him. Yes, indeed.

[Father Jim Martin]

Yeah. He was also my provincial for a long time, and he wrote a number of books. I think the best is called God and you, where he compared the spiritual life and the life of prayer to a friendship. And he said everything that you could say about a good friendship, you can say about your relationship with God. And, you know, one of his insights was, for example, good friends can sometimes be silent with one another. And he takes the example of walking on a beach. He said, sometimes it's good to talk and listen, of course, and be honest. He's very big on being honest in prayer. But he said sometimes, and I love this image, if you're walking on a beach, you don't want to say anything to your friend. And in fact, he says in one of his books, saying something would actually, in a sense, destroy the experience. Right. Of just being together.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

And it's interesting, isn't it, that friends in the tradition are equals. Friendship always lifts into equality. And so our friendship with God, in a way, is based on the fact that God became one of us so that we might share the life of God living the mystery of the Trinity as the divine. Friendship is very down to earth because you commit yourself to each other, you go on being faithful, and you always are lifting or God lifts us into sharing the divine life.

[Father Jim Martin]

Well, a bit more of a personal question. So when you are in those moments and you're maybe sitting quietly by yourself in chapel or maybe after communal prayer, what is your prayer like? What's going on inside of you? What happens when you pray?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I wish I knew, Jim. I really not much idea. I mean, I start the morning before we have the communal prayer, and a lot of the time I'm really thinking about what's going to be for breakfast. And, oh, dear, I've got to do this podcast with Jim later on today. What shall I talk about? But there was an old Benedictine abbott, he said, if you think you really pray for more than about three minutes a day, you're fooling yourself. And I think a lot of it is you just quietly let the noise go down and you're there, and what happens? I don't know. All I know is I can't do without it. If I don't have that time of silence, the whole of the rest of the day is changed.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Cardinal TIMOTHY I have to admit that it's a great relief to hear you say that maybe you have three minutes of focused prayer and that so much of the rest of the time is just sort of allowing everything to sift out. But both you and Jim are kind of spiritual masters at this point, and you've had a lot of practice, at least being in silence or observing silence on retreat. So I'm curious for the both of you, was this difficult when you first joined the Jesuits and the Dominicans? Was this practice of observing silence a challenge for you?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I don't know about you, Jim. It was for me. In those days, all the novices we were 12 novices would gather together with the rest of the community for half an hour. And I used to find it a nightmare secretly trying to look at my watch to see how much longer we had to go. But it grows on you. I think what's happened was I stopped thinking of silence as a negative thing, and I began to think of it as a positive thing. Not as not talking, but more as being with. And then it began to become easier.

[Father Jim Martin]

Yeah, I found that we don't have that tradition of kind of the silence in community or, you know, some of the monastic orders would have the grand silence where you didn't talk. But I think what I found most difficult was that hour of prayer as a novice, because mainly during faith sharing with the other novices, the other novices would say, oh, I felt God said this to me, or God was really close. And then God invited me to look at this. And I remember thinking and saying to my first spiritual director, what are they talking about? Am I supposed to hear voices or see visions or. And I think one of the benefits of spiritual direction was, for me, and I think still is for many people, is to have a director who can say, you know, it's okay if something is dry, but pay attention to things like insights, emotions, memories, feelings, things that come up in your prayer, even words and phrases, desires. He even said, you know, something like, even if you feel calm physically, you know, to see that as a sign of God's presence. So I think for me, the mystery that was sort of dissipated and not a good mystery was what's supposed to happen when you close your eyes. That was my big problem. And, you know, in my book Learning to Pray, I talk about that because I think it's such. It's such a confusion for people. They don't know what's supposed to happen. And then they feel if nothing happens or if they don't see visions or have some great insight, then they've failed. Right. But I. I think you're right, Timothy. I've never heard that before. I really do think, yeah, three minutes a day, if you can really kind of get there. Timothy, what do you do when you're struggling with prayer? What would you. What do you do yourself? And how do you counsel people?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I had a good advice from a fellow, another fellow Novitz, called Simon Tugwell. And Simon always said, when you go to pray, you're not there to do something. You're there to be available if God wants to do something with you, I find that immensely helpful. So instead of sitting in the choir thinking, what am I supposed to be doing? I'm there if God wants to do something to me.

[Father Jim Martin]

Now. Speaking of which, has your image of God and of Jesus changed over the years?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

It has, yes. I remember when I was a young friar having an evening with two religious, not Jesuits or Dominicans, and they went on and on about Jesus, their wonderful friend, and their beautiful personal relationship with Jesus. And I felt more and more of a fraud as the evening went on because I didn't think of Jesus as my beautiful palace. But I suppose what happened slowly is I discovered somehow that Jesus was present in every friendship. Every friendship was a revelation of the one who said, I call you friends. So I stopped feeling a complete fraud, just felt a little bit of a fraud.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

You said that it changed your image of God. What would you say your image of God was before you started to think about God as friend? In other words, did you have to dismantle any ideas about God in order to find something more authentic?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I was very challenged, I suppose, when I joined the order. I thought of God as the person who ran the universe, God as the supremely powerful one God. He's got everything under control. And one of the first lessons that we had as novices, whereas God, No, God's revealed in the weak person on the cross. That's the only image of God. We've got such a scandalous image that it took hundreds of years before they Ever dare to represent Jesus on the cross with his eyes closed. So I had to be dragged by my teachers. Beyond the idea of God as the controller. We live in a culture of control. So much about modern life is about controlling things. You can see it in our politics. I say no more. But our God is not so much a controller as one who walks somehow in the depths, the interior depths of our lives. Closer to me than I am to myself. As St. Augustine said, I love that.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

What about you, Jim? Did you have to dismantle any ideas about God as you grew closer to one that was more true for you?

[Father Jim Martin]

I remember someone saying that, you know, one of the Ten Commandments is you don't have false idols and that we tend to have an image of God in our minds. You know, often as Timothy was saying, God the controller or God the judge that you get from, you know, all sorts of places, from the church, from parents, from reading. And that that idol in a sense has to be smashed and destroyed because it's not real, right? It's your God. I often say to people in direction, let's say it's, I'm speaking to Maggie. The difference between Maggie's God, which is this judgmental figure that might be, as one friend of mine memorably described it, as a parole officer. So not only is God judging, but you've already done something bad in the. With your experience of God. And I'll sometimes say to people, what's your experience of God? And they'll often say, oh, when I feel God's presence, it's calm, it's peaceful, it's uplifting. And I say, well, that's God, right? So can you get rid of your God, Maggie's God? Can you smash that idol and really encounter God? God as God is being experienced by you. So I think it's a lot about getting rid of those idols and, you know, the God of surprises, right? I mean, as you never know what God's going to do or how God's going to be present. Timothy, I'm really interested in this idea of God as weak and I really am interested in talking with you about the wisdom that came from your brush with illness. We talked about this over dinner one night in Rome for our listeners who might not know. This was. You had cancer of the mouth, correct.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

First of all, and then of the jaw afterwards.

[Father Jim Martin]

Would you share a little about your experience and how you were able to pray through that and what it taught you? In a sense, it was a 17.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Hour operation and I was out unconscious for pretty well 30 hours. And when I came to, there was a young doctor who talked to me. And it was an experience of being stripped. I could barely talk. I was just lying in bed when I tried to pray the Our Father. I couldn't get past the two words, Our Father. I hadn't the strength to say anything more than that. And for weeks I was tormented by this awful, awful thirst because I couldn't drink any water because my mouth was being reconstructed, you know, by the surgery. And so I couldn't drink water for about a month. And you know, I longed. And when I could finally have a bit more strength, the prayer was, oh, God, you are my God. For you I long I could dry where we land without water. I thought I would kill for a glass of water. But I think what it did is the first wonderful thing it did, is that I looked at all the other people in the ward and I was just one of them. You know, it's so easy, isn't it, Jim, to have a self image? You know, we write, we give talks, and people know our names and it's easy to think we're important. But then suddenly you're nobody. You're just like anybody else really. Another body lying in a bed. Any achievements are entirely irrelevant. And I think that was the first thing that I learned was you don't have to merit God's love any more than anybody else. God's not interested in how many copies of our books we sell.

[Father Jim Martin]

Was it hard to allow people to care for you? Was that difficult?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

No. I had absolutely no option. It was a month before I could begin to get out of bed. Initially you had to be hosed down. You had to be cleaned by other people. And that first couple of times it is felt you feel a bit not humiliated. They don't want to humiliate you at all. But your privacy is taken away. But slowly you relax. This is who I am. This is how I am. And gosh, I'm alive. So you begin to rejoice in the fact that you're alive when you might easily not have been.

[Father Jim Martin]

One of the questions I asked you over dinner, which I'm fascinated by and I'm going to ask again, is did you ever feel sorry for yourself? And if not, why not?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

At the beginning, I don't think I even had the energy to feel sorry for myself. He just lay there like a beached whale. I don't think I felt sorry for myself. What did I say? Did I say something interesting, Jim, about that?

[Father Jim Martin]

You did. You said, I never Felt sorry for myself and I had a hard time understanding that. What about during, when you were diagnosed and in the lead up to the operation? Was there a sense of poor me or this is so unfair, which I think is common for a lot of people?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I don't think so. I mean, I was having to reconcile myself with the fact that I might well die and with this other cancer, this remains always a close possibility. And that's good. I mean, you enjoy being alive. Today is the only day I will ever have to eat this bowl of soup to talk to you and Maggie. So let's rejoice in it. One of the thing of immense help was that it was a week before I was diagnosed with cancer that I agreed to write this book with ukash. So I had a project. It was a future. I had to get better because we had to write this book. And I was excited about writing it. And I think that was a great blessing. Something lay ahead.

[Father Jim Martin]

I remember reading, maybe you've read it, Cardinal Joseph Bernadine's book, the Gift of Peace that came out, that he wrote during his struggles with cancer. And he said, I'll never forget it. He said, when you're in the hospital, he said, I'm never going to ask anyone else who's in the hospital, how's their prayer? Because in his experience, he said, you can't really pray, as you were saying, you know, the Our Father, just those two words when you're in the hospital. And he said, I'll never forget this. Your whole body is a prayer. You're sort of longing. So I'm curious, does that ring true to you? And did your prayer change as you move through that experience in any way?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I think that's absolutely fascinating. I think the experience of the Eucharist, I couldn't obviously get a Mass, but when I got a bit stronger, I could watch the live. The live streaming of Mass for my community, which we still have every day. And you know, at the heart of that, Jesus says, I give you my body. So at the heart of our faith is somebody who gives us his body. He's vulnerable. He's in our hands. Literally, we put out our hands and he places himself in our hands. And our utter vulnerability. And when you're lying in bed, you are. You're in people's hands. You're very vulnerable. There's nothing you can do. You entrust yourself to them. So I think the Eucharist was immense help. You had to live that vulnerability Eucharistically.

[Father Jim Martin]

Yeah, you know, I've always thought. When I celebrate Mass and I say, this is my body, you know, repeating what Jesus said, frequently, people think of it only or mainly as the. The real presence. Right. Jesus is now present in the Eucharist, which I believe, but I often think about that too, that Jesus offered his body for us on the cross, but also he takes his body from place to place. He goes from Nazareth to Capernaum, to Cana to Judea, to all these places. And it's a very sort of bodily way that he gave of himself. Not just on the cross. Right. And not just in the Eucharist, but day to day. Right?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Absolutely.

[Father Jim Martin]

He's. He's present to us in that way.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I love the fact that usually when Jesus meets somebody, he says to them, what can I do for you? What do you want? What are you talking about? He doesn't appear and say, oh, here I am. I'm going to solve all your problems. There's the immense humility, starts with them. What would you like? Sometimes it's pretty obvious. If you're a leper, you probably want to be cleaned of leprosy. But he never imposes himself. He's there for what you want.

[Father Jim Martin]

I love that, that, you know, even with Bartimaeus, you know, he's a blind beggar. You could assume that Jesus kind of knows what he wants, but he's still, yeah, what do you want me to do for you? Which is such an important question. I was just talking to someone last night at Directee. I will keep this anonymous. And he was thinking about a new job. And I suggested that he pray with Ignatius's prayer. You know, pray for what you desire, too. I think part of it is trying to understand what our deepest desires are. Right, Absolutely. I mean, if Jesus came in. Yeah, if Jesus came in and said, what do you want? I think I'd pause for a few seconds.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Do you think that one has to have a profound experience of vulnerability, be it an illness or a loss or a real hardship in life, in order to appreciate what you both are speaking to, that Jesus comes in this vulnerable state and meets us there sort of in the pits of our life? Because. And I asked this question because when the answer that you both gave about God meeting us in vulnerability was, when that answer was first given to me, like 20 years ago, I really didn't understand it. I think I wanted a God who was in control and who was powerful and who was not vulnerable to rescue me from the dredges of my life.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I love the passage in Ezekiel where he says, I will Take out your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I think that means that actually God leads us into joy and into sorrow, and they're inseparable. I think that the happiest, most joyful saints are those who are also capable of sorrow. St. Francis, you know, had the stigmata, but he was also the most joyful man who danced. Dominic, too. They say he wept at night for the brethren and he laughed during the day with them. I don't know about Ignatius. Would you say Ignatius Jim is a man of great joy and sorrow?

[Father Jim Martin]

Oh, sure. Well, he's certainly a man of great emotions. He would often cry during Mass, so much so that I think this is a great kind of contrast between him and Francis. So Francis cried at Mass and he ruined his eyes. Ignatius wept at Mass out of great consolation. And the doctor, this is so Jesuit, the doctor told him that he wouldn't be able to work and use his eyes if he didn't stop crying. So he stopped crying, which is very practical.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

That's obedience.

[Father Jim Martin]

That's right. But, you know, in my estimation, I always think of what my current spiritual director says, which is hard to hear, which is no humility without humiliation, right? And I think that young people. I remember I was directing a young person on retreat once who said, well, I've never suffered. And I said, well, you know, you will at some point. I mean, all of our bodies diminish and people die. And so I think it's. I think everyone has their own suffering, right? Even a very young person would have struggles, right, that they could understand as difficulties and they could see an entree into Jesus life. But I really do think the older you get and the more you experience loss, right? Humiliation, illness, it really does make you vulnerable. And the great insight for me was this. And this was thanks to a retreat. It's not that God makes you suffer these things so that you will experience God. It's not that God is giving you these punishments or suffering so that you will come closer to God. It's that. But we all are so in touch with, as Timothy would say, our need to control that the illness or the humiliation or the difficulty breaks us down and makes us more vulnerable. And it's easier for God to get in, right? God is always there. But we have this wall of wanting to make sure everyone thinks we're cool and everything is fine. And it's when those walls fall that God's able to enter. And I think that's why people say, you know, when I was sick, I experienced God more when I lost my home. And people tend to think, oh, this is God punishing them, you know, and therefore they. Or it's a crutch. No, it's that their defenses are down and God can get in more easily. So that's how I look at it.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Yeah, that's a really beautiful insight. Thank you for that.

[Father Jim Martin]

We're going to pause for a short break, but we'll be back in a minute. We were talking about the insights you got during your illness. Other insights that come with just age per se.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I hope so. When I was young, you know, I was very conscious of what people thought of me. I'd say something, I'd think, oh, is that stupid? Do they think I'm bright? Do they think I'm foolish? Do they think I'm any good? Do they think I'm good looking? You have all these questions of self consciousness and you stumble around. Often I think back with embarrassment to my life as a young friar, often without much awareness of what you're doing to other people. And I think as you go old, you actually realize that one's own self is not that interesting. You know, other people are much more interesting. And I would say one of the things that I've discovered, I try to live with is we go in a sense of the playfulness of life. Hugo Rahner, Karl's younger brother, read a lovely book about homo lu dens, playful humanity. And the older I get, the more I think, gosh, conversation should be playful. And when Jesus says, you must become like a child, it's because children know how to play and we take ourselves too seriously. GK Chesterton said angels can fly because they take themselves lightly.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Yeah, that's great.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

And so I think one of the great liberations of growing old is to be playful in conversation with the brethren when they come to confession. We don't actually have the tradition so much of spiritual direction, but when you accompany people, they come bring to liberate them from being over serious about themselves.

[Father Jim Martin]

Yeah, it's funny you're talking about humor. I remember I was on a retreat once with a very wise old Jesuit and I was having trouble with a superior of mine and I was being very serious and I said, I think the Lord is inviting me to let go of my need to have him approve of me. And I went on and on. It was very serious and kind of what I was trying to draw from this. And this guy who is very holy and very kind and in no way kind of mean or anything, he said, oh, well, Jim, he said, you're forgetting something very important. And I thought he was going to talk about Christ's suffering. And he says, that guy's a jerk.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Wonderful.

[Father Jim Martin]

It was wonderful. And it was just funny. And it just. Yeah, it just made me realize I was taking myself too seriously as well. I do want to talk a little bit about our shared experience at the synod. And as many people will know, the synod, which was this worldwide gathering of Catholics that took a couple of years and had two sessions in Rome in October 2023 and October 2024, you were one of the two spiritual directors, which was quite wonderful. And so many things you said that are gathered in your book, Listening together have really meant a lot to me. I guess one of the questions I have is, how did you prepare for that retreat? I mean, it must have been such a. Such a kind of overwhelming responsibility. Did you feel like that? And how did you prepare for it?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I did. I felt absolutely terrified. I didn't do it alone. And I've always found the best way for me to prepare is to talk to people and to listen. And so it wasn't a solitary preparation. It was a synodal preparation for the synod conversation, always being puzzled, turning to people, saying, I don't know, what should I think? What do you think? So I think the pleasure, the joy of preparation was that we walked together in preparing the synod.

[Father Jim Martin]

Well, I'd like to ask you to dilate on two things that I will never forget. And that really stuck with me from the first session and the second session. I think this is applicable to everyone. In one of your first retreats, you said that really our goal at this, in this session is to become friends, and that that is not a waste of time. You made a joke, oh, all they did was fly to Rome just to become friends. And you quoted St. John Paul II, who said, Affective collegiality precedes effective collegiality. And it goes back to what you were saying about Dominican spirituality as founded on friendship. Can you talk about friendship as a requirement for dialogue in the church and why that's so important?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Friendship is always very concrete. You don't have friends. In abstract, you have particular friends, and you delight that they exist. I love it. It's attributed to Augustine, actually. He didn't really say it, but how does it matter? Volo ut sis I want you to be. And I think when you make friends, you just delight that they exist. You delight in their particularity, the way they talk, their accent, the way they walk, the way they smile. And I Think friendship brings you down to earth. It's incarnational. There is somebody who might not exist, and you know they do. They never have before. This person's never existed before. Utter gift. So opening your eyes to the other person's face. I'm a great believer in the importance of the face. In Christianity, we see each other's faces. Go into a church and it's filled with faces. You don't find that in a synagogue, and you don't find it in a mosque.

[Father Jim Martin]

What did you mean, people don't see. I'm curious, don't see faces in mosques and synagogues. What did you mean? And they do in churches?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Well, I mean, both Judaism and Islam are against the portrayal of the face.

[Father Jim Martin]

I see.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Whereas we believe that God became human in a human face.

[Father Jim Martin]

I see. Now, how does becoming friends help us to bridge the divides that there are in the church and in the world and sort of confront all this polarization, would you say?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I think that in my experience. And people are different. In my experience, part of being a friend is you share your questions. You mightn't agree in the answers, but you share the question. So if I meet somebody whose views theologically are quite different from mine, do I dare to say ask them, but why? Why do you believe that? Why is the Tridentine rite important to you? Why do you want to have lots of incense? And I have to make that question, in some sense, mine. And I think that's a great challenge in religious life and in the church. We refuse the polarization by appropriating, making our own, the difficult questions that people carry around. And that must mean I am also prepared to share that. I doubt. I question. I don't know. Because then you become very vulnerable. That's part of the vulnerability. I wish I knew, but I don't. Can you help me?

[Father Jim Martin]

Well, it's important in families, communities, parishes, the church, nations. I think that's so key. The next insight, which I really. I'll confess to you. I think I may have said this to you privately. You know, I've been a Jesuit for about 40 years, and you figure I've heard it all. But one of the things I loved about your retreats was it was real. There was so much new there. One of the images that I'll never forget in the second session was the image of the Net with both its sort of knots and its spaces. Can you talk about that? I just found that so profound when.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Thomas Aquinas, you know, who I ought to have mentioned more when Aquinas asked About love. He said, the two become one but remain two. And I think that's wonderful. You've got to really become bound up with each other in friendship. But you also have to leave a space. You can't devour the other person. You can't gobble them up. So I think friendship needs both those dimensions. It's true in the friendship between different cultures, you know, how we relate to, for example, as Westerners, to an African culture. And it's also true with the friendships that we have with our closest friends, personal friends, how to be one with them but not to devour them. I know when I was a young friar and, you know, I was always falling in love. I think most of my life been constantly being falling in love with people. And I wanted complete and utter union. And it's part of growing old, I think, and gradually decaying that you learn to love their freedom.

[Father Jim Martin]

So the net, as you were saying in the retreat, the net is a wonderful way of understanding friendship and even the church, because we need the ties that bind us, but we need the space. And I think you said something like, you know, without those ties and without the space, you know, Peter couldn't have pulled in all those fish, right? There's room for everybody. I thought that was so wonderful.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I was delighted to discover it. Because what I love is that when Peter pulls the net in, hitherto he's been weak, uncertain, incapable of anything, and suddenly he can pull in the net. And that's not because he's strong. It's because Jesus is so attractive. It's the attractiveness of the Lord that pulls in the net. Sometimes we think, oh, I've got to be terribly strong. I've got to do all these important things. But that's not true. It's the attraction of the Lord who draws all things to himself when he's lifted up.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Well, we have spent such a wonderful hour or so talking about friendship and dialogue and the importance of questions. And so I wonder if I might sneak in one last question, which comes from our audience. Would you be all right with that?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Absolutely.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Okay, great. So this comes from Pam, and she asks, what is the reason for prayer if we want God's will?

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

I think if you had a friend and they kept ringing you and saying, can we meet? We'd like to have a drink. We'd like to go out for a meal. And you said, no, I have no time for that. You'd wonder what the friendship was. I think the second thing I'd say is, God loves to give us Things. God is the great giver and he gets pleasure surely in giving us what we want. So it's part of the joy of prayer that we say to God. Yes, I'd like some of this. I'd like an answer to these questions. Please look after my mother or whatever. So we ask God, not because God doesn't know what we want, but it adds to the depth of the pleasure of the giving.

[Father Jim Martin]

Well, Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe. Timothy, my friend and my favorite new cardinal. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for your wonderful writings, your retreat notes at the synod and just thanks for being a wonderful friend to so many people. A good Dominican.

[Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe]

Thank you. J. And thank you for asking me. It's a delight to be with you. And you, Maggie too.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Yes, thank you. It was really fun.

[Father Jim Martin]

Isn't he amazing?

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Yeah. I delight in every chance I get to talk to or listen to Cardinal Timothy Radcliffe.

[Father Jim Martin]

Part of the joy of this conversation was knowing that you were listening.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Oh, yeah.

[Father Jim Martin]

Because I. Well, yeah, because I want to kind of share him with people because he's so incredible. I think he's a very holy person. He's one of the deepest spiritual thinkers that I've met. And I have to tell you that during the retreat at the synod, I was blown away by a lot of the things that he said. I found them so profound and so helpful. Just on a personal level, on a spiritual level, on an ecclesial level. He's just such a treasure. And I really, I was really happy that he was able to share about that operation. I mean, a 17 hour operation, you know, he came close to death and yet someone who was able to find God and all that and not pity himself and be very real about it. I think that. But I thought that was so beautiful that he said that I was just like everybody else. Right. And I didn't have time to feel sorry for myself. I was just kind of a body. It's just so real.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Yeah. And such a model, really. Because at one point or another I think we're all going to experience that kind of diminishment or vulnerability. I know in the times that I have been in that position, I don't think I handled it as gracefully as he did. I think. I think I've pitied myself. But what I love is that he models what a response could be.

[Father Jim Martin]

Right, that's right.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Not to say that like, you know, we all have our human responses to really challenging times, but to say like, actually another way is possible.

[Father Jim Martin]

That's a great point because I think you Know, people who are listening, you know, it's okay to feel sad, obviously, and disappointed and.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Or scared.

[Father Jim Martin]

Scared, absolutely. And wondering where God is. But you're absolutely right to say that this is another way. Right. There's another way that's open to us. Right. That's a way of vulnerability and sadness, but also hope. And, you know, at the end, this is someone who is still living with cancer. Right. He's still playful. I also love this idea of, look, I have this day, right? I'm having this bowl of soup, and as you said, I'm talking with. With Maggie and Jim, and isn't that a great thing to rejoice about? So it's a great way of living in the present. You know, I was on a retreat once. So much of the spiritual life, I think, are these kind of cheesy sayings, which I actually think are really helpful. Yeah. I was on a retreat once, and this woman was giving a reflection, and she said, when God is with Moses, God does not say I was. God does not say I will be. God says I am.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Oh, it's present tense.

[Father Jim Martin]

Yes, the present tense. And that's what he was talking about with us, this sense of being in the present and rejoicing, even in the midst of all these difficulties. And so I just loved having him on. I was just so delighted.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Yeah. Sometimes I think that the whole point of podcasts is really just introducing one friend to another where you're like, you gotta listen to this person. You gotta join this conversation. It's so fruitful. Or they're so wise or they're just so wonderful.

[Father Jim Martin]

Yeah, exactly. And I hope people go out and listen. They can listen to his retreat talks, which really are for everybody on the Vatican News YouTube channel. You can buy his book Listening Together, which is beautiful. And you can buy his other books, too. So I hope that people who may not have been familiar with him are encouraged to learn a little bit more about him and read about him and read his own writings and listen to him as well.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Yeah. Go down that rabbit hole.

[Father Jim Martin]

Well, thank you, Maggie, for joining us. Of course.

[Maggie Van Dorn]

Happy to be here.

[Father Jim Martin]

And thanks to all of our listeners, too. The Spiritual Life with Father James Martin is a production of America Media. It's produced by Maggie Van Dorn and our executive producer, Sebastian Gomes. We record in the William J. Loshert Studio in New York City with the production assistance of Kevin Christopher Robles and Grace Lenihan. Our audio engineer is Noah Levinson. Adam Buckmuller edited the video of this episode, which will be made available on America Media's YouTube channel. The theme score is courtesy of Teddy Abrams. You can follow me across social media amesmartinsj. Also, please help us grow the show by leaving a five five star review on your favorite podcast platform. If you love the spiritual life, then we have even more to offer you on America Media's website. Keep informed and inspired about our Catholic faith. Become a subscriber [e-mail] subscribe or click the link in the show notes. Thank you and God bless you.

[Catholic Healthcare]

Body, Mind and Spirit. We believe if one needs help, so do the others as part of Catholic Healthcare's holistic approach to treating the whole person. Here, people are not viewed as symptoms or insurance claims, and when we treat the body, mind and spirit, we believe the whole person will thrive. Catholic Healthcare Learn more at wecareyouflourish.org Sponsored by the Catholic Health Association.