Pope John Paul II: A Biography
March 22, 2000 - The first Polish primate in history, Pope John Paul II was elected as the successor to Pope John Paul I on October 16, 1978. The length of his papacy is just a wink of an eye in the two millennia history of the Roman Catholic Church, but few popes have had as much influence on the church and its faithful, or caused as much controversy in the world at large.
He was born Karol Wojtyla on May 18, 1920, in Wadowice (Krakow), Poland. His early years were laced with family tragedy; both his parents died while he was still a young man, as did his older brother, Edmund. In 1939, while Poland was still under Nazi occupation, Wojtyla enrolled in a Krakow university to begin studies for the priesthood. Fellow students remembered him as quiet and reflective. He supported himself by working as a laborer.
By the time young Wojtyla became Father Wojtyla, the Soviet Union had clamped an Iron Curtain on Poland. The place of the church in Poland is unique, because it was the church that kept alive the Polish nation for the 150 years it disappeared off the world maps, swallowed up first by Germany and then by Russia. So the struggle to keep faith alive in a totalitarian state determined to stamp it out was a familiar fight in Poland. It forged in Wojtyla a determination and a commitment to conservative tradition that has lasted throughout his life.
He moved rapidly through church ranks and was made Cardinal in 1967. Eleven years later came the sudden death of Pope John Paul I. It took the College of Cardinals two days and eight ballots before there was the traditional white smoke over the Vatican, signaling the selection of a new pope.
The church - and the world - was stunned. The new pope was Cardinal Karol Wojtyla, the first non-Italian pope in 455 years, the first from a communist nation, and at age 58, one of the youngest popes ever. In a nod to his predecessor, he took the name John Paul II.
Relief and joy was felt among the Vatican crowd that night, alongside a certain expectation. What would this new papacy bring? It didn't take long to find out. John Paul II had inherited a church that was split by dissent over doctrine, losing members in many parts of the world. He was determined to renew his church by getting back to basics.
"The value of the family is threatened because of social and economic pressures. We will stand up and reaffirm that the family is necessary," he proclaimed. His message was twofold. To the world, he preached peace and respect for human rights. To his chuch, he preached a return to that old-time religion and resistance to latter-day pressures from those who try to fashion the church to accommodate modern times.
He has spoken out against birth control and abortion and women in the priesthood. He's taken that message on the road to more than 60 countries and is the most traveled pope ever. He even has his own popemobile. He mastered six languages as a youth, and in the more than 20 countries he has visited, he talks to people in their language.
His first important trip abroad was to Latin America, home to almost half the Roman Catholics in the world. It was a controversial visit. Before the Latin American bishops gathered in Mexico, the pope sternly rejected the so-called theology of liberation, a doctrine of social commitment that fused the Catholic faith with elements of Marxism. Many Latin American priests had adopted it in their fight for social change. The pope's position shocked many liberal Catholics who wondered how a church leader who once struggled against political repression could now deny that opportunity to others.
To the more than 1 billion Catholics and millions who are not, Pope John Paul II is box office, a household name - especially in the United States. On the first of several trips to America, he visited nine cities in just ten days. That same year he made his first trip as pope back to Poland. Poland's government was still as communist as ever, but its people had never lost their religion, and what at times seemed like their entire population came out to welcome him and listen to his message to "keep the faith".
The world has come to know him as the people's pope. But all that traveling, all that hands-on contact with people of the world had its risks. Ironically, it wasn't on a trip abroad, but right at home in St. Peter's Square, when he was shot by a would-be assassin in 1981. The assailant, Mehmet Ali Agca, was a Turk with a criminal record and a known terrorist. It was later alleged that he was connected with the Bulgarian secret service, which in turn was run by the Soviet KGB.
For a time it wasnt certain whether the pope would live. Hundreds of millions of Roman Catholics and others prayed for him for days. The bullet damaged his intestines, but Pope John Paul II survived.
Even those who disagree with the pope about the direction of the church admire him for what he is: A poet, a playwright, an actor in his youth, an intellectual (he's written more papal pronouncements than any pope before him, all in his own hand). He wrote a book that was on the bestseller list worldwide for months.
In the '90s with Communism gone, the pope turned his attention to capitalism, and reminded the world of some of the economic ills it was suffering - that there is more to business than business.
Early in 1998, his body ailing from the effects of Parkinson's disease but his mind and spirit still strong, John Paul journeyed to one of the last outposts o world communism, Fidel Castro's Cuba. It was a triumph for the pope and for Cuba's Catholics, who had persevered under decades of official atheism.
On the dawn of the church's next millenium, Pope John Paul II embarked on a "spiritual pilgrimage" to the Holy Lands of the Bible. He looked at Israel from the hills where Moses first saw the Promised Land, and said the process of seeking peace in the region must continue, no matter how difficult.