By Judi McLeod ——Bio and Archives--July 30, 2019
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It’s got to be one of the greatest ironies of our times that the Communists in the Red Square will remember Pope John Paul II longer than the Vatican.
No one terrified the Kremlin more than Pope John Paul II when he was Bishop Karol Wojtyla often leading Mass in Nowa Huta, Poland open fields, in the face of brutal Communism."Nowa Huta was a brand new town built by the Communists in the early `50s outside of Krakow. The town was in Bishop Karol Wojtyla’s jurisdiction. It was meant to be a workers' paradise, built on Communist principles, a visible rebuke to the `decadent’, spiritually besotted Krakow. “The regime assumed that the workers, of course, would be atheists, so the town would be built without a church. But the people soon made it clear they did want one. Wojtyla communicated their desire, and the regime opposed it. "The conflict became an intense symbol of the opposition between the Catholic Church and the Communist State. It was a conflict between the workers’ world that was supposed to be beyond religion--and the actual workers singing old Polish hymns that started with the words, `We want God.’ The Communist Party reluctantly issued a permit in 1958 and then withdrew it in 1962.
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"Years went by as Karol Wojtyla joined by other priests–especially Father Gorlaney–met with authorities and patiently filed and refiled for building permits. Crosses were put up in the designated area and then pulled down at night, only to mysteriously reappear weeks later. "Meanwhile Bishop Wojtyla and other priests gave sermons in the open field, winter and summer, under a burning sun, in freezing rain and snow. Year after year, Wojtyla celebrated Christmas Mass at the site where the church was supposed to be built. Thousands peacefully lined up for communion, but tension was building. "By this time, the Communist, local leaders, residents and Catholic Church had dug in, their positions seemingly intractable. The Communists’ compromise to allow a church to be built outside the town was ejected--until Karol Wojtyla, the realist, the negotiator broke the stalemate, persuading everyone that the existence of the church transcended all other considerations. The time to bend was now. "In May 1977, one year before he became Pope--almost 20 years after the first request for a permit--Karol Wojtyla consecrated the church at Nowa Huta. "What the worshippers were most proud of--and it was a symbol Karol Wojtyla helped make into a reality--is the gigantic crucifix that hangs over the new altar. It was made out of shrapnel that had been taken from the wounds of Polish soldiers, collected and sent from all over the country to make the sculpture in the new church.”
"From the first day of his election, John Paul II’s pontificate raised concern in Central Committee headquarters. (Canada Free Press) "Canadian reporter, Eric Margolis, described it this way: "I was the first Western journalist inside the KGB headquarters in 1990. The generals told me that the Vatican and the Pope above all was regarded as their number one, most dangerous enemy in the world. "Again and again, people told us that it was John Paul II’s 1979 trip (to Poland) that was the fulcrum of revolution which led to the collapse of Communism. Timothy Garton Ash put it this way: `Without the Pope, no Solidarity, Without Solidarity, no Gorbachev. Without Gorbachev, no fall of Communism’ ("In fact, Gorbachev himself gave the Kremlin’s long-term enemy this due: `It would have been impossible without the Pope.’) "It took time; it took the Pope’s support from Rome--some of it financial; it took several more trips in 1983 and 1987. But the flame was lit. It would solder and flicker before it burned from one end of Poland to the other. Millions of people spread the revolution, but it began with the Pope’s trip home in 1979. As General Jaruzelski said, "That was the detonator.”The life and times of John Paul II can NEVER be purged from the JPII Institute, just as the bullet fired at him at close range by Mehmet Ali Agca could never kill him. “As a sign of his gratitude, Pope John Paul II gave the bullet that was used in his assassination attempt to the shrine of Our Lady of Fatima. The bullet was a perfect fit in the crown of the statue of Our Lady of Fatima at the shrine in Portugal.” (Patheos.com) No cardinals can ever succeed on a “systematic purge of the last remaining “Wojtylians”’. It would be the equivalent of getting elephants to fly, or as F r. Z, so eloquently put it “ “What’s next? Disappear people out of airplanes?” And mostly because the spirit of Karol Wojtyla and all of the Wojtylas live on forever in our hearts.
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