Homily in memory of Father
Heinrich Pfeiffer, S.J.
The great family of the
faithful and of the devotees of the Holy Face share the sorrow of the relatives
and Jesuit confreres of dear Father Heinrich Pfeiffer. We thank the Lord for
giving us this brother for 82 years. Our faith tells us that he lives in the God
of that life that will never end. In 1939 he was born in Tübingen (Germany) and
on last November 26 the Lord called him
to himself in the city of Berlin. He went to God full of merits, having carried
out well the project assigned to him.
At the age of 24 he entered
the Society of Jesus and at the age of 30 he became a priest, graduating at
Basel in Art History and teaching the history of Christian Art at the Gregorian
University in Rome until a few years ago.
He held various positions of
responsibility: director of the Advanced Course for the Cultural Heritage of
the Church, member of the Pontifical Commission for the Cultural Heritage of
the Church, member of the editorial staff or of the research committee of
various journals. He was the author of a number of books and published essays
in a number of magazines in German, Spanish, English and Italian.
Thanks to his deep expertise
in the field of Christian Art History, he was invited by many institutions in
different parts of the world for courses, seminars and conferences in the field
of Art History, Christian Iconography, and Sindonology: from Spain to Mexico,
from Austria and Germany to Italy and France. He turned out to have an
encyclopedic mind, to be a profound scholar, a researcher full of insights. He
had a personality firm and decisive in carrying things forward, courageous in
going even against the current. His speech was simple, precise and profound,
without superfluous words. He was affable and sociable, always with a smile, sensitive,
respectful.
He was a guest a number of
times in our friary of Manoppello when he was free from commitments or during
the feasts of the Holy Face. The last
time was during the May 2018 festivities, walking along in the procession mixed
in with the devotees and pilgrims.
He prayed and meditated a great deal.
He spent much time contemplating the Holy Face.
Thanks to him it was possible
to organize an exhibition on the Holy Face at the University of Chieti and then
in other cities of Italy and even in the French shrine of Lourdes.
Providence wished that he should
dedicate himself to the Holy Face of Manoppello, after having dealt with so
many images of the Face of Christ and the Holy Shroud of Turin.
In 1979 the Trappist nun
Blandina Paschalis Schlömer, after seeing in a magazine the image of the Holy
Face, in an article by Renzo Allegri, which recalled the exhibition on the Holy
Face in Pescara organized by a Capuchin friar, Father Domenico da Cese, tried
to superimpose the Shroud over the Holy Face, and it turned out that there was
a perfect match. All the research material
she produced, on the advice of her confessor, she sent to a German Jesuit
sindonologist Werner Bulst. It happened that Father Pfeiffer was present when
the professor opened the nun's packet and the latter, since he had an expert in
the field in front of him, entrusted him with everything to examine it. Fr.
Pfeiffer, who had always gone in search of the authentic face of Christ, and in
fact, had collaborated with Cardinal Fiorenzo Angelini for the annual
conferences on the search for the Face of Christ, found the discovery of Sister
Blandina intriguing and studied it for some years. In 1986, he went to
Manoppello. Arriving at the shrine, as he himself said in an interview, "I
was quite astounded, and I recognized in that face that of the famous
"Veronica", the cloth preserved in St. Peter's for centuries, which
had disappeared during the sack of Rome in 1527". He argued that the
Veronica, true icon, or Sudarium, is the face of Jesus imprinted upon the veil
at the moment of the resurrection, and that the Shroud, also imprinted in the
tomb of Jesus, portrays Christ suffering after his passion. Each of the cloths is
a true miracle that challenges scholars and science: Only with faith is it
possible to explain this mystery. On his tombstone one could write,
paraphrasing the words of St. John the Evangelist inspecting the tomb of Jesus
at Easter: "He saw and recognized!"
Father Pfeiffer engaged the
writer Paul Badde and the journalist Saverio Gaeta, in the research and
dissemination of the Holy Face, each of whom have published several books on
the Holy Face.
The news that "The Roman
Veronica has been found in Manoppello", he announced during a conference for
the foreign press in Rome in 1999: it went around the world at once, causing a
lot of sensation and popularity for the mysterious veil and also for the city
of Manoppello, so much so that it led the municipal administration of
Manoppello to confer honorary citizenship upon the German scholar on December
8, 1999.
But the matter also created
hostility and opposition on the part of many Jesuit colleagues and other
religious orders, prelates of Rome and other cities which accompanied Father
Pfeiffer until his death and that he suffered patiently, convinced that in the
small town of Abruzzo there is the greatest treasure in the world.
Despite all this, he became
the link in the chain of witnesses who eventually led Pope Benedict XVI to the
true Icon of Manoppello on September 1, 2006, where he recognized in the image
of the veil "the human face of God," as he said six days later in St.
Peter's Square in Rome. The death of Father Pfeiffer was a great loss for
everyone and caused much mourning among the people. The first to give the news
was his friend and compatriot Paul Badde, followed by Antonio Bini and the
rector of the shrine Father Antonio Gentili through means of the internet. The
Archbishop of Chieti-Vasto Msgr. Bruno Forte wished to commemorate Fr. Pfeiffer
with a message of esteem and thanksgiving and the mayor of Manoppello Giorgio
De Luca expressed the desire to name a street in the city after him, near the Shrine.
In thanking Father Pfeiffer
for all that he has done for our shrine and for us Capuchins we entrust him to
the mercy of God so that He may welcome him to contemplate the infinite Beauty
of that living and true face that he has already seen as in a mirror in the
veil of Manoppello.
Rest in peace.
Manoppello, December 15, 2021
Fr. Carmine Cucinelli
Fr. Carmine at St. Peter's Basilica in Rome for the procession of Omnis Terra, January 16, 2016
photo by Paul Badde
 |
| Br. Vincenzo d'Elpidio with Paul Badde and Antonio Bini |
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