Prague, Jan 23 (CTK) – Czech Cardinal Miloslav Vlk, 84, suffers from lung cancer with bone metastases and he will undergo chemotherapy, his website www.cardinal.cz has announced.
Vlk’s health troubles appeared last spring and he had to be hospitalised before Christmas. Doctors diagnosed him with cancer in early January. Now he is staying in home care.
“He accepted the diagnosis calmly, when the professors announced it to him. It was he who supported them and assured that he is following the right path, since he believes that his departure is the best solution,” the web writes.
In the autumn, Vlk stayed in a spa with joint pains, but his trouble further worsened afterwards. His left shoulder swelled and he suffered from dizziness.
On Christmas Eve, he was admitted to a coronary unit with heart rhythm disorder.
A CT scan and bronchoscopy confirmed lung tumor with bone metastases.
Vlk was born in Lisnice, south Bohemia, on May 17, 1932. In 1968, he was ordained priest, but ten years later, the communist regime banned him from working as a priest. He started celebrating masses secretly for small groups of believers.
A historian, archivist and theologian by training, he was forced to earn his living as a window cleaner for political reasons in the 1980s.
In the early 1990s, he was appointed bishop of Ceske Budejovice, south Bohemia.
After the resignation of Frantisek Tomasek, he became the Czech Catholic primate in 1991.
He was appointed cardinal in October 1994.
On June 1, 1991, Vlk became archbishop of Prague. Pope Benedict XVI accepted his resignation in February 2010 when he also appointed his successor, Dominik Duka.
