The Catholic Weekly 24 May 2020

15 24, May, 2020 catholicweekly.com.au THE CONTINUITY between St John Paul II and Pope Fran- cis is rooted in the message of God’s divine mercy for all men andwomen, retired Pope Benedict XVI said in a letter commemorating his prede- cessor’s birth. Throughout his life, St John Paul sought to spread the message that “God’s mercy is intended for every individual,” Pope Benedict said in a letter to Polish Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz, the former archbish- op of Krakow and longtime secretary to St John Paul II. “John Paul II is not themor- al rigorist” some people have portrayed him as being, the retired pope wrote. Instead, “with the centrality of divine mercy, he gives us the oppor- tunity to accept the moral re- quirement for man, even if we can never fully meet it.” The retired pope’s letter was released by the Polish bish- ops’ conference on 15 May in anticipation of the 100th anni- versary of the birth of St John Paul on 18 May. Pope Benedict’s letter re- called his predecessor’s hum- ble beginnings and youth, the death of his mother, brother and father and the difficulties Poland lived through after World War I and, especially, during World War II. The youngKarolWojtyla, he said, “not only studied theolo- gy in books but also through his experience of the difficult situation that he and his coun- try found themselves in. This is somewhat characteristic of his whole life and work.” After his election as pope in 1978, Pope Benedict con- tinued, St John Paul found himself leading a church that was “in a dramatic situation” in which the deliberations of the Second Vatican Council spilled over “to the public as a dispute over the faith itself.” Furthermore, Pope Bene- dict said that the dispute led ¾ ¾ Junno Arocho Esteves Pope of God’s mercy Retired pontiff sums up the extraordinary life of his friend and predecessor In continuity with each other: Pope Francis, St John Paul II and former Pope Benedict XVI. PHOTO: CNS to a “feeling that nothing was any longer certain,” particu- larly in the implementation of liturgical reforms, whichmade it seem “that the liturgy could be created of itself.” “At that time, sociologists compared the church’s situ- ation to the situation of the Soviet Union under the rule of Gorbachev, during which the powerful structure of the Soviet state collapsed under the process of its reform,” he recalled. Nevertheless, from the start of his papacy, St John Paul “aroused new enthusiasm for Christ and his church,” espe- cially in his words to Catholics during his inaugural Mass: “Do not be afraid! Open, open wide the doors for Christ!” “This call and tone would characterise his entire pontif- icate and made him a liber- ating restorer of the church,” Pope Benedict wrote. “This was conditioned by the fact that the new pope came from a country where the council’s reception had been positive: one of a joyful renewal of everything rather than an attitude of doubt and uncertainty in all.” Through his foreign trips and encyclicals, he continued, St John Paul sought to present the church’s teaching “in a hu- man way” and always centred on the theme of divine mercy inspired by the message of St Faustina Kowalska. The retired pontiff, who served as prefect of the Con- gregation for the Doctrine of the Faith from 1981 until 2005, recalled St John Paul’s desire to honour St Faustina’s wish to establish the Second Sunday of Easter as a feast day dedi- cated to divine mercy. Pope Benedict said he was “impressed by the humility of this great pope” when the congregation “responded negatively” because the feast would overshadow the “an- cient, traditional and mean- ingful date” that concluded the Octave of Easter. “It was certainly not easy for the Holy Father to accept our reply,” Pope Benedict said. “Yet, he did so with great humility and accepted our negative response a second time. Finally, he formulated a proposal that left the Second Sunday of Easter in its histor- ical form but included divine mercy in its original message.” Remembering the Polish pontiff’s death on the eve of the feast of Divine Mercy, Pope Benedict said that “the light of God’s mercy” stood as a comforting message in his final hours. The retired pope also ad- dressed calls for the late pope to be referred to as “St John Paul the Great.” The church’s judgment of a person’s ho- liness and heroic virtues, he said, is not the recognition of “a kind of Olympic achieve- ment but rather that some- thing becomes visible in and through a person that is not his own but God’s work, which becomes recognisable in and through him.” For example, he explained, without military or political power, “Leo the Great was able to convinceAttila, the prince of the Huns, to spare Rome,” thus proving that “in the struggle between the spirit and power, the spirit proved stronger.” “Undisputedly, the pope’s faith was an essential ele- ment” in the former Soviet Union’s collapse, he said. “Let us leave open the question of whether the epi- thet ‘the great’ will prevail or not,” Pope Benedict conclud- ed. “It is true that God’s power and goodness have become visible to all of us in John Paul II. In a time when the church is again suffering from the op- pression of evil, he is for us a sign of hope and confidence.” - CNS No evidence of coverup: postulator THE POSTULATOR and the commission involved in in- vestigating the life of Pope John Paul II for his sainthood cause found no evidence that the pope knowingly neglected or covered up abuse scandals, the postulator said. Mons Slawomir Oder, the promoter of the cause, told re- porters in Rome during an on- line meeting on 15 May that he and investigators saw nothing “that couldpossibly be claimed as (being) a shadow of guilt in regard to John Paul II.” However, Mons Oder also explained that the investiga- tors did not have direct ac- cess to the relevant Vatican archives but had to send the topics they wanted to explore ¾ ¾ Carol Glatz and questions to the Secretar- iat of State. The Polish monsignor had been asked whether it would have been better to have been more careful or to have wait- ed longer before beginning the pope’s sainthood cause given what has come to light concerning past abuses by the late Marcial Maciel Degolla- do, founder of the Legionaries of Christ, and Mr Theodore McCarrick, a former cardinal. Mons Oder told the re- porter that during the saint- hood process “all questions were faced, even the ones you are talking about” related to abuse. “Extensive research was carried out in the Vatican ar- chives,” he said, speaking in Italian. The historical commission, which is part of the tribunal that hears from witnesses and examines documents and facts about the sainthood candidate’s life, is in charge of investigating different sub- jects and accessing archives directly, he said. However, the Vatican ar- chives they needed to access were – and still are – closed, he said. Materials related to each pontificate are restricted, with access usually granted only 75 years after the end of the pon- tificate. It was possible, instead, “to draw up questions perti- nent to the subject” of abuse and then the “research of the documents was carried out by people authorised by the Secretariat of State, experts,” he said. A panel of reviewers at the Congregation for Saints’ Caus- es voted unanimously in 2009 that Pope John Paul had lived a life of heroic Christian virtue. “I can say that we did everything, and we found nothing that could in some way hinder the path of the cause of John Paul II,” he told reporters. - CNS ‘Do not be afraid! Open, open wide the doors for Christ!’ This call and tone would characterise his entire pontificate and made him a liberating restorer of the church.” Pope Benedict XVI An image of Pope John Paul II is displayed during his beatification at the Vatican in 2011. PHOTO: CNS/MAX ROSSI, REUTERS Angelicum launches Institute for saint THE PONTIFICAL University of StThomas Aquinas in Rome celebrated the 100th anniver- sary of the birth of its most fa- mous alumnus by launching an interdisciplinary institute bearing his name. The St John Paul II Insti- tute of Culture was to have its formal launch – livestreamed – on 18 May, the anniversary of the birth of the Polish pope who earned his doctorate in philosophy in 1948 from the university, which commonly is called the Angelicum. Dominican Father Michal Paluch, university rector, said the new institute is not de- signed simply to promote the study of St John Paul’s philos- ophy, theology and life, but rather to explore ways his vi- sion of what it means to be hu- man and part of a community can respond to modern chal- lenges in social life, the arts, law, economics and politics. “The strength of his pon- tificate,” Father Paluch told Catholic News Service, was his firm conviction about Christians acting as witnesses for Christ in the world while also “being willing to learn from others, all those who do not share our understanding of the world and our values.” The institute will be part of the faculty of philosophy and will begin offering courses in the fall of 2020, although the special guest professors will not offer their courses until early 2021. Remi Brague, professor emeritus of religious philoso- phy at the Sorbonne in Paris and at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, will lec- ture on anthropology and cul- ture; Franciszek Longchamps de Berier from the Faculty of Law and Administration of the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland, will offer a course about the relationship between anthropology and law; and Jaroslaw Kilian, pro- fessor at the Polish National Academy of Dramatic Art in Warsaw, will offer an inter- disciplinary theatrical exper- iment, combining lectures, a workshop and the perfor- mance of St John Paul II’s play, Job . “Education today cannot be only about the past, dif- ferent ideas that we want to put into the heads of our stu- dents,” Father Paluch said. The lectures, workshops and play should “leave seeds deep in the hearts and minds of our students.” “We don’t want this insti- tute to be a kind of repetition of what John Paul II said and what he did,” the rector said. “Those are important to re- member, but we want to make him a partner in our conver- sation. And it should be much more than just quoting his different documents and dis- courses; it should be about entering into conversation with him.” - CNS ¾ ¾ Cindy Wooden ST JOHN PAUL II AT 100