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To who?
The guy was only one of the dozen or so most important figures of the latter half of the 20th century.
To who?
To those who are happy that communism failed, that Eastern Europe is free.
I can understand that leftists might be mad at him for that and might celebrate his death. While he stood for the plight of the poor, he believed in helping them through faith and charity, rather than letting a handful of leftist elites run the state.
Unfortunately for them, the Power by which he worked lives on.
I'm not even Catholic, but I do have a sense of history.
Chopper, of course I care. I wouldn't ask if I didn't. I'm just curious about what a pope is needed for. Obviously, I'm not catholic and in fact I believe all organized religion is mis-guided. I admit that I'm a bit of a troll and I do like to create tension. However, I do like to hear what people say.
And by the way, it's Jessica Alba, not Jennifer Alba.
Show me where in the bible it says believe in the pope and you go to heaven,
The Pope is only a man. The Bible talks about not worshiping a man or a statue.
I went to catholic church for 3 years straight and not one person priest or anyone came up to me and asked me if I was saved, The only reason I didn't say anything sooner is cuz there are so many Catholics that chances are I might piss off many including webmasters and moderators.
I look at all those people on TV and I read all about theso called Pope lovers on the WWW
And I am willing to bet maybe 2% of them even read the Bible other than on Sunday.
Jesus was right there will be a large group of people who will be mislead and will burn in the lake of fire.
Last edited by Victor Newman; 04-01-2005 at 04:57 PM. Reason: I found out Kori was Catholic
Pope John Paul II: Cold Warrior with a cross
'They trembled before the pope'
By John Christensen
CNN Interactive
On June 2, 1979, just eight months after his consecration as pope, John Paul II returned to his native Poland for a nine-day visit that heralded the beginning of the end of the Soviet empire.
The pope said Mass that day in Victory Square in Warsaw, a place more often the scene of army parades and rallies orchestrated by the ruling communist government.
Officially, Poland was atheist, and the government had confined and thwarted the church at every turn, stopping just short of outright confrontation. But Poland had been a stronghold of Catholicism for more than a 1,000 years. It would take more than 35 years of communism to snuff out that faith.
So it was that 250,000 Poles crowded into the square to behold this robust and charismatic fellow Pole, charged with emotion and special purpose, standing beneath an enormous wooden cross.
To understand himself, the pope told his listeners, man must understand Jesus Christ. He can understand neither who he is nor what his truth may be, neither his vocation nor his final end, without the help of the Lord.
After a pause, the pope then uttered words that could only be regarded as at once an affirmation to the faithful and a challenge to the secular authorities:
"Therefore, Christ cannot be kept out of the history of man in any part of the globe, at any longitude or la ude of geography. ... Christ cannot be kept out of this part of the world. To try to do this is an act against man."
The applause began slowly, then rose in a crescendo, thundering across the square again and again like storm waves battering a seashore.
For eight long minutes the applause continued. And when it began to subside, and the pope, hand on his chest, was unable to continue, the singing began.
"Christ conquers, Christ rules," they sang, hundreds of thousands of triumphant voices. And from among the yellow and white papal flags in the crowd a banner was unfurled that read: "Freedom, independence, protection of human rights."
'The pope was the real power'
It was, says a bishop who was there that day, "an awakening."
"Everyone suddenly perceived that the pope was the real power," the Rev. Jan Sikorski, a priest, told the Boston Globe. "The police meant nothing. The politicians meant nothing. They trembled before the pope. The people did not sing the Internationale, they sang church hymns."
Media reports estimate that despite a virtual news blackout in Eastern Europe, news of the pope's visit to Poland reached 40 million Catholics behind the Iron Curtain.
A year later, the Solidarity trade union was born in Poland. In time, the movement would enlist 10 million Poles as members, and priests visiting the imprisoned Solidarity leaders often concealed messages of encouragement from the pope in their robes.
In the autumn of 1989, Solidarity played the pivotal role in bringing down the government and replacing it with a democracy.
Attempts have been made to credit the pope with the subsequent fall of the Soviet empire over the next few years, but without much credibility.
No other country was as strongly Catholic as Poland, and policy experts say there are too many other variables to make such a generalization. Mikhail Gorbachev's decision not to use the Soviet army in Poland and elsewhere, experts say, probably was more the result of Russia's economic decline and the realization that in the future he might need Western help.
Pushing over the first domino
Nevertheless, John Paul is credited with helping to push over the first communist domino. Others in the Eastern bloc were not only encouraged but emboldened by his support for freedom and rights.
"There was never any doubt in the way the pope talked that he wanted to bring their system down," a Vatican official told the Chicago Tribune in 1992. "He always believed the division of Europe was a bad thing, and he was concerned that the peoples of Eastern Europe should take their rightful place in Europe."
Joaquin Navarro Valls, the pope's spokesman and one of his closest advisers, told the Tribune that the pope was certain communism would fall.
"He was convinced that it was so corrupt it could not last forever," Navarro said. "He was basing himself in philosophical and moral ground, and that was the thing the communists feared most. They knew how to deal with political pressure, but they didn't know what to do with moral pressure."
for Chopper...
uhhh Duff...Ronald Reagan wasn't the pope...To those who are happy that communism failed, that Eastern Europe is free.
I can understand that leftists might be mad at him for that and might celebrate his death. While he stood for the plight of the poor, he believed in helping them through faith and charity, rather than letting a handful of leftist elites run the state.
uhhh Duff...Ronald Reagan wasn't the pope...
Agreed CC. Captain Ron had much more to do with the collapse of communism than the pope.
TLong, sometimes the silence is a good medicine, if you donīt care about the Pope, ok, but respect the people who think different.
What are you talking about?uhhh Duff...Ronald Reagan wasn't the pope...
Where have I dis-respected anyone?
I'm not even criticizing the Pope himself actually. He seems like he is or has been a good person. However, I will criticize the "position or office" of the pope.
I'm sorry... that CNN article is too long for people with short attention spans to comprehend it.uhhh Duff...Ronald Reagan wasn't the pope...
Short version: JPII was the moral force behind the Solidarity movement in Poland, and by extension, the anti-communist movements in Eastern Europe.
Ronald Reagan didn't do it by himself.
Well, yeah, if we agreed with the "position" of the papacy, we'd probably be Catholic.
Pope John Paul: A giant bent by illness
By Philip Pullella
February 25, 2005 - 1:07PM
Adored by some, attacked by others, Pope John Paul II is perhaps the most widely recognised person in the world.
On the world stage, he has been at once a champion of the downtrodden and an often contested defender of orthodoxy within his own church.
In recent years, the world has watched the decline in the health of the 84-year-old Pope, who has both Parkinson's disease and severe arthritis. He has been unable to complete his prepared speeches and has difficulty pronouncing his words.
Yesterday, the Pope was rushed to hospital in Rome for the second time this month with a relapse of flu, reviving fears in the 1.1 billion strong Catholic world that one of the most historic pontificates is nearing an end.
The Polish Pope burst on the scene on October 16, 1978, when cardinals in a secret conclave chose him as the first non-Italian pontiff in four and a half centuries.
The third longest-serving pope in Roman Catholic history, the steely-willed John Paul ushered his church into the new millennium despite his sapped stamina.
Historians say one of the Pope's most lasting legacies will be his role in the fall of communism in Eastern Europe in 1989.
Poles believe his unflagging support for the banned Solidarity trade union while communists tried to crush it was a potent force keeping the movement alive.
Solidarity formed the East Bloc's first non-communist government in 1989, marking the start of a wave of freedom which saw Marxist regimes fall like dominoes across Europe.
"Behold the night is over, day has dawned anew," the Pope said during a triumphant visit to Czechoslovakia in 1990.
Read your history, dammit.
Make sure you don't say anything bad about Catholics on KTSA they will run you off the radio.
I love John Paul II.
Love? What kind of love? The love that a local priest shows to an 11 year old boy? Or the love you say you have for your religion and faith and yet you have never invited me to church, why is that?
All of a sudden everyone and there mother is a catholic. You folks make me laugh...
I'm not Catholic. But I respect the Pope. But I don't think that his death would bother me more than anyone else's death bothers me that I don't know. To me, it's sad because of the loss of human life, but not much more.
Respect is one thing, saying his life means more than Maria Schiavo is another, or do you feel The Pope is better than us?
My God ' what, or who, did you people worship before he even got the the Job? What about Pope John the first?
Does anyone here really read the Bible?
damn it
You all are ing high as usual.
The Pope is the most recognizable and respected human on the face of the earth. Whether you are a Catholic or not, the Pope is a symbol of leadership within religion that breaks all barriers of all races, religion and culture.
Pope John Paul has reached out to the youth like no other Pope has.
I also don't think referring to the Pope as a Pedophile like the noncomedian Mouse alluded to is bull .
Have a little respect for the Pope and what he stands for. It doesn't matter if you are religious or not. As far as the earth goes, no one is more respected than the Pope.
As for whether the Pope is more important than Mouse? I would say Yes times one trillion.
Dude has done more for the world than anyone.
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