HAPPY POSTHUMOUS BIRTHDAY - THE PILGRIM POPE

A day like today was born Saint John Paul II, the pilgrim Pope

Source - ACI Prensa

On May 18, 1920, Karol Wojtyla, who in October 1978 would become Pope John Paul II, was born in the small town of Wadowice (Poland).

The future pontiff was born into the home of Karol Wojtyla, a noncommissioned officer in the Polish army who died in 1941, and Emilia Kaczorowska, who died on April 13, 1929, when the boy was eight years old.

He was the youngest of three brothers. The oldest was called Edmund and he died in 1932; He did not get to know her sister Olga de Ella, because she died before Karol was born.

His mother had a difficult pregnancy

In the book “Emilia and Karol Wojtyla. Padres de San Juan Pablo II”, the author Milena Kindziuk narrated that Emilia had a complicated pregnancy and that she was depressed by the insistence of her first doctor, Jan Moskala, to have an abortion.

However, the faith of both parents led them to make "a bold decision that, regardless of everything, their baby was going to be born." So they looked for another doctor, the Jew Samuel Taub, who confirmed the complications of the pregnancy and that it could cause the death of the mother, but did not suggest abortion.

According to Kindziuk, on May 18, 1920 at 5 in the afternoon the father went with his eldest son, Edmund, 13 years old, to the church to participate in the prayer of the hours and where they sang the Litany of Loreto; while Emilia stayed at home with the midwife.

“We know from the messages that Emilia asked the midwife to open the window: she wanted the first sound her son could hear to be a song in honor of Maria. In short, Emilia Wojtyla gave birth to her son, listening to the song from the Litany of Loreto,” she said.

His childhood and youth

After losing his mother, Karol received his First Communion at the age of nine and Confirmation at the age of eighteen. After completing his studies at the Wadowice High School, he enrolled in 1938 at the Jagiellonian University.

However, in 1939 World War II broke out and Nazi Germany occupied Poland. That year the invading forces closed the university and the young Karol worked between 1940 and 1944 in a quarry and then in the Solvay chemical factory in order to survive and avoid deportation.

In 1942 he felt the call to the priesthood and clandestinely attended the training courses of the major seminary in Krakow, which operated secretly and was directed by Archbishop Adam Stefan Sapieha.

In his book Gift and Mystery, Pope John Paul II recalled the influence of his father on his vocation, whom he described as "a deeply religious man" and whose "example was, in a way, my first seminary."

After the war, the seminary was reopened and the young Karol was able to continue his training. However, the country that had been liberated from the Nazis was now part of the communist bloc of the Soviet Union.

Priesthood and Bishopric

Karol Wojtyla was ordained a priest in Krakow on November 1, 1946. "This day is indelibly etched in my memory," the Pope said in 1993, because on that day "I received the gift of the priesthood of Christ and became a servant of the Eucharist".

Later, the 26-year-old priest was sent by Cardinal Sapieha to Rome, where in 1948 he obtained a doctorate in theology with a thesis on the subject of faith in the works of Saint John of the Cross. That same year he returned to his country.

On July 4, 1958, Pope Pius XII appointed him Auxiliary Bishop of Krakow. He received episcopal ordination on September 28, 1958 in Wawel Cathedral (Krakow) by Archbishop Eugeniusz Baziak.

Pope Saint Paul VI named him Archbishop of Krakow in 1964 and in June 1967 created him Cardinal.

Likewise, he participated in the Second Vatican Council and collaborated in the drafting of the final text of Dignitatis humanoe , the decree on religious freedom; and Gaudium et spes , the pastoral constitution on the Church in the modern world.

Pontificate of John Paul II

On September 28, 1978, Pope John Paul I had died and all the bishops were called to Rome, including Cardinal Karol Wojtyla, then Archbishop of Krakow.

On October 14, ten days after the funeral of the Holy Father, the bishops met in the Sistine Chapel to begin the conclave, which lasted two days, since after eight votes Cardinal Wojtyla was elected, who took the name of John Paul II. With his election, a tradition of four and a half centuries of Italian pontiffs was broken.

The pontificate of Saint John Paul II lasted 26 years and five months, the third longest in history. During that time he made 104 apostolic trips around the world, for which he was called the "pilgrim pope."

Among the events that occurred in his pontificate are the attacks he survived on May 13, 1981 and May 12, 1982.. The first, committed by the Turkish Mehmet Ali Agca, strengthened his devotion to the Virgin of Fatima.

Likewise, there is his role in the fall of communism in Europe, with the disappearance of the Soviet Union, and his defense of the unborn and the family.

Pope John Paul II passed away on April 2, 2005. He was beatified by his predecessor Benedict XVI on May 1, 2011 and canonized by Pope Francis on April 27, 2014.

To learn more about Saint John Paul II enter HERE