Lino Ricardo Luciano Rodriguez (January 7, 1936 – April 20, 2025)

On Easter Sunday, Lino Ricardo Rodriguez passed away, surrounded by his beloved and loving family and practicing his faith, a faith so deep as to be inseparable from his life and character.

Born in La Habana, Cuba as the only child of Lino Rodriguez and Carmen Cabrera, he often shared his childhood memories with his cherished cousins of family life at La Finca, a family farm owned and built by his grandparents.

This love of family and the profound joy he always felt amid the swirl of family life was the rock upon which he built his own family with Mara Rodriguez. After meeting as teenagers, they fell in love and were married in 1959. This love between them was always a light to others. Holding hands or gazing at each other, to see them together was to see that love is real and infinite.

After moving to the United States in 1962 from Cuba with his wife and young son, Lino displayed his love of family and his resiliency by starting over again from scratch, becoming a respected business leader because of his integrity, work ethic and thorough knowledge of the steel industry. In the years to come, the family grew, and their four children are blessed to have had such loving parents and to witness their parents' love for each other and for living a life based on working hard and caring for others.

A composed and natural leader, he and Mara were deeply involved in the Cursillo movement and the KAIROS Prison Ministry, an interdenominational Christian ministry that addresses the spiritual needs of incarcerated people and their families. With their committed marriage and obvious love for each other, he and Mara also became leaders as Marriage Encounter facilitators, helping other families grow in love and care.

In a second career at Saint Patrick's Catholic Church in Mount Dora, he devoted his time and life to serving his community in any way possible, a community that showed their love and respect with the title of "Don Lino." Throughout his life, he modeled a life of strength, wisdom, care and gentleness. To the end he called on us to forgive others, to see all people as equal and worthy of love, and to love everyone without judgment and without reservation.

He is pre-deceased by his grandson, John Michael Keating, and survived by his widow, Mara Rodriguez; his children, Lino Rodriguez, Marita Rodriguez, Ricardo Rodriguez, and Ana Rodriguez; his grandchildren, LJ Rodriguez, Lauren Williams, Alex Rodriguez, Jake Rodriguez, Joey Rodriguez, Amada Merritt, Ciera Merritt, Cameron Keating, Sean Keating, Coletrane Rodriguez, and Parker Rodriguez; and his great grandchildren, Leila Bunch and Claire Lucia Williams, Layla Rose Brunch.

In lieu of flowers, please consider making a donation to Hope CommUnity Center at https://hcc-offm.org/