He was a pope of superlatives – with the second longest pontificate in history, with most of the travel kilometers of a pope, which earned him the nickname “hasty father”, with the most appointments of cardinals and bishops, as the author of numerous documents, but also literary texts. John Paul II spoke more blessed and holy than all of his predecessors combined. During his tenure, among other things, a new church law, the Codex Iuris Canonici from 1983, and the “World Catechism” came out. In record time, this pontiff was also honored as an honor to the altars: he died on April 2, 2005 and was canonized on April 27, 2014.
When a new pope entered the central loggia of St. Peter in Rome on October 16, 1978, it was a sensation. Most people in St. Peter’s Square have just heard his name for the first time. They are still puzzling over his origins when he, whose mother tongue is Polish, gives a spontaneous speech in almost accent-free Italian. He addresses mourning for the sudden death of Pope John Paul I, and calls for the gates to be opened for Christ. The cardinals had now called a new bishop of Rome “from a distant country, far away, but so close to the community in Christian faith and tradition”.
The man “from a distant country”, at 58 years still relatively young for a pope, is called Karol Wojtyla. He was ordained bishop in 1958, has been Archbishop of Kraków since 1964 and was one of the youngest participants in the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965). For the first time in four and a half centuries, the Bishop of Rome does not come from Italy, to which Cardinal Franz König, Archbishop of Vienna, also contributed. Although Karol Wojtyla wants to call himself Stanislaus first, he finally chooses the name of his predecessor. He knows how popular the smiling Luciani Pope John Paul I was, whose pontificate lasted only one month. John Paul II also has a winning smile and charismatic charisma. His public appearances, his gestures become food for the media, which pay close attention to him and to which he approaches himself without fear of contact. The kiss on the ground after air travel is becoming his trademark. With celebrated appearances at world youth gatherings, he remains in the memory of a generation of young Christians.
Karol Wojtyla was born 100 years ago on May 18, 1920 in Wadowice near Kraków. He lost his mother when he was nine and twelve years later all other close relatives were dead. Despite an inclination to literature and theater, he became a priest after the war.
He was ordained bishop in 1958 and became archbishop of Kraków in 1964. He is one of the youngest participants in the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965). His election to the Pope and his trip to his homeland in June 1979 gave opposition forces in Eastern Europe, especially Poland, a strong boost and alarmed the communist rulers. Millions of people are at risk when John Paul II is critically injured in a gun attack on May 13, 1981 in St. Peter’s Square. The Pope played a significant part in the fact that communism in Eastern Europe collapsed like a house of cards ten years later. It is of crucial importance, of course, that a man like Mikhail Gorbachev comes to the helm in the Kremlin in Moscow, who is completely opposed to a massacre, such as that which the Chinese leadership perpetrated on Tian’anmen Square in Beijing in June 1989.
Dialogue – a big concern
The political, but also the inner church action of this Pope is shaped by Polish Catholicism and his experiences in a church in the struggle with anti-religious systems – at a young age with National Socialism and later with Communism. He remains averse to everything that seems Marxist to him, including for him the Latin American theology of liberation.
But John Paul II is also increasingly criticizing capitalism and consumerism in the West. He denounces social injustices, threats to human dignity, “structures of sin” and a negative “culture of death”. He not only rejects abortion and euthanasia, but also the death penalty and modern reproduction techniques. In the Iraq conflict in 2003, he opposed the politicians George Bush, Tony Blair and José Maria Aznar, who believed that “just wars” could resolve conflicts.
John Paul II is concerned with dialogue with other denominations and religions. This is reflected in the prayers for peace in Assisi, in the joint declaration by the Catholic and Evangelical Church on the doctrine of justification, in the request for forgiveness for crimes committed by the Catholic side and in his trip to Israel in 2000. He is engaged in Catholic-Jewish dialogue like no other Ahead.
Nobody will deny that he went down in history as a great Pope, but many will rightly view his pontificate critically and find weaknesses in it. Because in his own church, John Paul II acts less as a “bridge builder” (pontiff), but also as a divide. He has little interest in pluralism and disappoints everyone who hopes for reforms. In matters of sexual morality (contraception, remarried divorced) and understanding of office (no priesthood for women or without celibacy), the pontiff has a clearly traditional line in all of its statements and measures. It promotes ore-conservative movements that share this line. Theologians and bishops who deviate from this are punished by Rome. For the episcopate, John Paul II prefers men who emphasize absolute obedience to the magisterium. This also leads to incorrect appointments. In Austria the case of the cardinal Hans Hermann Groër from Vienna, who was recalled in 1995 after allegations of abuse, is still vividly remembered.
Crippling reform jam
How much people suffer from the reform of the internal church may be a problem for members of the church. However, what concerns the cover-up of scandalous abuse cases in the Roman Catholic Church, which is still largely common during the term of office of John Paul II, but also the criminal machinations of the Vatican Bank at the time, are two problems that have nothing to do with questions of faith and their treatment this Pope has obviously failed. Only those who close their eyes can overlook the fact that the pontiff from Poland was not only a figure of light, but also left its successors with a heavy legacy with a number of burdens.
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