Pope John Paul II (1920-2005)
- Born Karol Józef Wojtyła, in Wadowice, Poland on May 18, 1920,
- Made a cardinal in 1967.
- Became Pope on October 16, 1978.
- Survived assasignation attempt in 1981.
- Was the first non-Italian pope in 455 years and the first of Slavic origin in the history of the Church.
- Made over 100 trips abroad, travelling a distance far greater than that travelled by all other popes combined.
- Visited in 2001, Syria, Greece, and Malta to retract St. Paul's missionary journeys.
- First Pope ever to enter a mosque.
- Note: Out of the 264 popes in history there were 7 Syrian Popes. They were: Evaristus (107), Anicetus (168), John V (687), Serguis I (701), Sisinnius (708), Constantine I (715), and Gregory III (732)
- For more info on this go to: www.catholicculture.org/docs/doc_view.cfm?recnum=2741
Many thanks to Firas for supplying this additional information.
I was very sad when he passed away.. hopefully the next Pope will be just as good
Posted by x | Tuesday, April 05, 2005 10:29:00 AM
I was very sad when he passed away.. hopefully the next Pope will be just as good
Posted by x | Tuesday, April 05, 2005 10:30:00 AM
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Posted by x | Tuesday, April 05, 2005 10:36:00 AM
The new Pope will have big shoes to fill ...
Posted by Dina | Wednesday, April 06, 2005 1:24:00 AM
no i don't think he will Dina, because Jean Paul 2, did al what the others before him can't do:
asked Jews for forgiveness, went to a mosque, and gave gays some rights (not sure of that but i heard it form many people)..
so what's left to the new pope?
he will be anyway just a pope; i mean we're not living in the middle ages when the Catholic church controlled Europe. and now most of the recent Europeans love him but they don't follow all what he says anyway, and sometimes most of them don't take it seriously, or even disagree with him.
so the pope as i think is now a respected man more than being a considered man: he can not stop a war, but he prays for peace..
he can not stop starvations, but he calls for help.. and so on..
i know it's important to have someone like him, as a very good representative face, but i don't think that any other pope in this times will be different.
and it's just an opinion.
god bless his soul.
Posted by Amr Faham | Wednesday, April 06, 2005 1:52:00 AM
Well that's what I meant by what I said Amr...The new Pope will have to live up(and probably won't) to all the big things the late pope had achieved...
And as for giving gay rights, that's not true cause I read on BBC.com that he frequently criticised the liberalism which he saw all around him and that gay people incurred both his wrath and his pity
Posted by Dina | Wednesday, April 06, 2005 2:19:00 AM