The courageous globetrotter pontiff

Had Saint John Paul II still been alive and not elevated to a sublime eternity in the Father’s House as he was fifteen years ago, on 2 April 2005, he would be celebrating his 100th birthday on 18 May, 2020.

John Paul II, who was the first Pontiff to visit Malta, in 1990 and again in 2001, is mostly remembered for his inexhaustible service, for his spiritual leadership, for having introduced the Church to the third millennium of the faith and for his extraordinary witness of holiness. However, he is also remembered as the Pope who survived an attempt on his life (1981) and also as the hardheaded and courageous globetrotter Pontiff who sometimes had to face even arduous and dangerous situations.

One particular example of John Paul II’s courage was when he arrived in El Salvador on March 6, 1983. To agree to the visit, the Government of El Salvador had insisted that the Pope must ignore the tomb of Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero, who was assassinated in 1980, while celebrating the Holy Eucharist. Nonetheless, the Pope insisted on visiting Archbishop Romero’s tomb and refused to budge from in front of the cathedral where Romero was buried unless the cathedral door was opened for him to enter and pray on the murdered bishop’s tomb.

At the open-air Mass which followed, when the pope explained that he had just been to the cathedral, the crowd of 750,000 burst into applause. The pontiff went on to proclaim Archbishop Romero as “a zealous and venerated pastor who tried to stop violence. I ask that his memory be always respected, and let no ideological interest try to distort his sacrifice as a pastor given over to his flock.” The right-wing groups surely did not want to hear that. They portrayed Romero as one who stirred the poor to violence.

Another example of how the pilgrim Pope used to handle difficult situations was in Nicaragua, also in 1983. When he was contested by a hostile group of people organised by the Government during a mass in Managua, the Pope took the microphone in his hand and shouted: “Be quiet!” He obtained silence right away.

Worked in a quarry and a factory

Karol Józef Wojtyła, the future pope of the family, as he himself once said he wanted to be remembered, was born in Wadowice, Poland, on 18 May, 1920.

He was the third of three children born to Karol Wojtyła and Emilia Kaczorowska, who died in 1929. His father, Karol, a noncommissioned officer in the Polish army, died in 1941.

After completing high school in Wadowice, Karol enrolled in the Jagellonian University of Krakow in 1938. When the occupying Nazi forces closed the University in 1939, he worked (1940-1944) in a quarry and then in the Solvay chemical factory to earn a living and to avoid deportation to Germany.

Feeling called to the priesthood, he began his studies in 1942 in the clandestine major seminary of Krakow. During that time, he was one of the organisers of the “Rhapsodic Theatre”, which was also clandestine.

After the war, Karol continued his studies in the major seminary, newly reopened, and in the school of theology at the Jagellonian University, until his priestly ordination in Krakow on 1 November, 1946. Father Wojtyła was then sent to Rome, where he attained a doctorate in theology (1948). While a student in Rome, he spent his vacations exercising pastoral ministry among Polish emigrants in France, Belgium and Holland.

In 1948, Father Wojtyła returned to Poland and was appointed a curate in the parish church of Niegowić, near Krakow, and later at Saint Florian in the city. He was a university chaplain until 1951, when he again undertook studies in philosophy and theology. Later he became professor of moral theology and ethics in the major seminary of Krakow and in the theology faculty of Lublin.

On 4 July, 1958, Pope Pius XII appointed Father Wojtyła auxiliary bishop of Krakow, with the titular see of Ombi. He was ordained bishop in Krakow, on 28 September, 1958.

On 13 January, 1964, Pope Paul VI appointed Bishop Wojtyła as Archbishop of Krakow and subsequently, on 26 June, 1967, created him a Cardinal.

Bishop Wojtyła took part in the Second Vatican Council (19621965) and in the five assemblies of the Synod of Bishops prior to the start of his Pontificate.

On 16 October, 1978, Cardinal Wojtyła was elected Pope and on 22 October he began his ministry as universal Pastor of the Church.

104 apostolic journeys

Pope John Paul II made 146 pastoral visits in Italy and, as the Bishop of Rome, he visited 317 of the current 322 Roman parishes. His international apostolic journeys numbered 104 and were expressions of the constant pastoral solicitude of the Successor of Peter for all the Churches.

His principal documents include 14 Encyclicals, 15 Apostolic Exhortations, 11 Apostolic Constitutions and 45 Apostolic Letters. He also wrote five books.

Pope John Paul II celebrated 147 beatifications, during which he proclaimed 1,338 blesseds, and 51 canonisations, for a total of 482 saints. He called nine consistories, in which he created 231 Cardinals (plus one in pectore).

From 1978, Pope John Paul II convoked 15 assemblies of the Synod of Bishops: six ordinary general sessions, one extraordinary general session and eight special sessions.

Attempt on his life

On 3 May, 1981, an attempt was made on Pope John Paul II’s life in Saint Peter’s Square. Following a lengthy stay in the hospital, he forgave the attempted assassin and intensified his pastoral commitments with heroic generosity.

Pope John Paul II also demonstrated his pastoral concern by erecting numerous dioceses and ecclesiastical circumscriptions, and by promulgating Codes of Canon Law for the Latin and the Oriental Churches, as well as the Catechism of the Catholic Church. He proclaimed the Year of Redemption, the Marian Year and the Year of the Eucharist as well as the Great Jubilee Year of 2000, in order to provide the People of God with particularly intense spiritual experiences. He also attracted young people by beginning the celebration of World Youth Day.

No other Pope met as many people as Pope John Paul II. More than 17.6 million pilgrims attended his Wednesday General Audiences (which numbered over 1,160). This does not include any of the other special audiences and religious ceremonies (more than eight million pilgrims in the Great Jubilee Year of 2000 alone). He met millions of the faithful in the course of his pastoral visits in Italy and throughout the world. He also received numerous government officials in audience, including 38 official visits and 738 audiences and meetings with Heads of State, as well as 246 audiences and meetings with Prime Ministers.

Pope John Paul II died in the Apostolic Palace at 9:37 p.m. on Saturday, 2 April, 2005, the vigil of Sunday in albis or Divine Mercy Sunday, which he had instituted. On 8 April, his solemn funeral was celebrated in Saint Peter’s Square and he was buried in the crypt of Saint Peter’s Basilica.

John Paul II was beatified in Saint Peter’s Square on 1 May, 2011, by Pope Benedict XVI, his immediate successor and for many years his collaborator as Prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

He was canonised on 27 April, 2014, together with Pope John XXIII, by Pope Francis.