by Javier Trapero
Madrid – Father Emiliano Tardif , a Canadian priest of the Congregation of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart and a well-known preacher of the Catholic Charismatic Renewal, began his missionary work in the Dominican Republic shortly after his priestly ordination in Canada. After several years of intensive pastoral work, he became seriously ill with pulmonary tuberculosis. The illness forced him to return to his homeland, where he was hospitalized with a poor prognosis. Doctors deemed at least a year of hospitalization necessary for his recovery. His story is told in the film “Día 8. El soplo del Espíritu,” which premiered in Spanish cinemas on May 8.
Father Emiliano was convinced that his mission was to live alongside the poorest and those most in need of Jesus’ merciful love. The postulator of the cause of beatification, Father Joaquín Herrera, MSC, highlights several key elements that shaped his missionary spirit. The first factor was his family history: his parents were deeply religious, and his father was known for his exceptional generosity. Father Emiliano himself said that his father possessed “the gift of poverty.” The second factor was the charism of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart, who are committed to proclaiming the message of Jesus, who loves every person with tender, compassionate, merciful, powerful, and unwavering love.
During his hospitalization, something happened that profoundly change his life. A group from the Catholic Charismatic Renewal offered to pray for his recovery. Although his previous experiences with this spiritual movement in the parishes where he had served had not been particularly positive, Father Emiliano accepted the offer. He reported that during the group’s prayer, he experienced a strong sensation of heat in his chest and gradually felt better. A few days later, the doctors were surprised to find that his tuberculosis had completely disappeared.
“His recovery,” Father Joaquín recounts, “transformed him into a man of prayer. I believe God is also calling me to become a man of deeper prayer. Those who work with honey leave something behind. I hope that’s true for me as well. I believe this work calls me to prayer, to internalizing it. It’s like being invited to lead a retreat: you consider how to share the Gospel with the participants, but then you realize that it also concerns you. To the extent that you involve yourself, the Lord tells you that this also applies to you.”
After returning to the Dominican Republic, Emiliano Tardif divided his time between parish work and preaching. Soon, however, he asked his superiors to dedicate himself entirely to the call he felt from the Lord: the proclamation of the living Christ. Father Joaquín explains it this way: “He combined the spirituality typical of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart with the missionary zeal of the New Evangelization. Devotion to the Sacred Heart was at the heart of his spiritual life. He proclaimed the Gospel of merciful love and represented the living Jesus in order to proclaim God’s love to the poor of this world, especially the sick. He was always there for them, trusting in God, who is love.” Father Joaquín recounts a remarkable anecdote that happened to him. In a conversation, Father Tardif compared them to donkeys carrying heavy loads to serve others. He could never have imagined that these words would be so deeply etched in his memory that, years later, they would give his book the title “Soy el burro de Jesús”.
Father Herrera met Father Tardif before his healing, but especially afterward, when the latter devoted himself entirely to proclaiming the living Jesus and developing his gift of healing. His story vividly reveals his inner transformation: “I saw a different Emiliano. An Emiliano who remained a fully-fledged missionary of the Sacred Heart, but now completely open to the Holy Spirit, who led him down paths he could never have imagined. As a person, he remained the same: helpful, hardworking, though more attentive to his health, very humble, and joyful. After his healing, I saw him more open, with a greater capacity to recognize God’s love. With a deeper conviction of Jesus’ words: ‘Whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these’ , which were reflected in his ministry of healing. A change in his vitality was palpable; he was wholeheartedly dedicated to his new mission with greater strength.”
He presented himself humbly, without emphasizing his studies or qualifications. He spoke of the experience of the living Jesus, active today, the loving Jesus. He felt chosen precisely for this. Whether he was speaking with an ordinary person in the Dominican Republic or meeting Queen Fabiola in Belgium, he made no distinction between people. His meetings were often attended by prominent figures. After his death, the President of the Dominican Republic even declared a national day of mourning. This was not only an expression of the sympathy of the population, the ordinary people he had helped and for whom he had become a missionary, but also a sign of greater social recognition of his work.
The ongoing work on the “Positio” also fits into this perspective. “I see the work on the Positio as a kind of ‘trap’ set by God,” Father Joaquín Herrera explains jokingly. “I have just completed an important assignment in Rome for the Congregation; I was actually supposed to return to Central America as a missionary, where I spent decades, but I decided to return to Spain, and now that I have more time for more intellectual pursuits, I am beginning to work on the Positio for the beatification process of Emiliano Tardif. I have already done this work for the Blessed Martyrs of Quiché in Guatemala. I will approach it with enthusiasm; I know it will be very demanding, but God will help me. I hope I am healthy enough to complete it. Perhaps I can submit the finished Positio in a year and a half.”
“The very task of preparing and waiting for the twelve volumes of documentation for the diocesan phase fills me with the need to pray,” he continues. “I do not know what this process holds for me; the Holy Spirit will enlighten me. My ordination card read: ‘Indeed, like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand .’” “This is one of the qualities I rediscovered in Emiliano, or at least perceived more strongly: He, too, was able to let go of many things in order to accomplish what God had entrusted to him—to proclaim a living Jesus and to heal people with great difficulties,” he concludes.
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