John Paul II: a man who took the words of Jesus seriously

by Dennis Heaney, President

The Christophers

Monday, April 2, marks the second anniversary of the death of Pope John Paul II. In some ways, it feels as though it were only yesterday.

We still have such a clear impression of the man who led the Roman Catholic Church for so long: first, the young, vigorous Cardinal Karol Wojtyla of Krakow, Poland, who brought a new energy to the papacy in 1978; then, the constant traveler who journeyed around the world to share the Gospel message with believers and non-believers alike; finally, the face of suffering and forgiveness who continued to fulfill his duties as long and as well as he could, even as he endured a painful recovery from an assassination attempt, the difficulties of Parkinson's disease and other ailments in his later years.

We were drawn to Pope John Paul II by his personal charisma, but we learned to love him because of his faithfulness, his humor, his courage. But, mostly, I think we loved him because he loved us first.

John Paul II came to meet us in country after country, city after city, year after year. In naming him Man of the Year in 1994, Time magazine called John Paul II the "most universal of Pontiffs." It was his deep personal desire to be "a pilgrim pope, walking down the roads of the world bringing to all areas the message of salvation." By the time of his death, he'd made more than a hundred pastoral visits outside Italy. In reaching out to the suffering and abandoned, he became a voice for the oppressed of the world.

He was a man who took the words of Jesus seriously: "Go into all the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation." (Mark 16:15) But Pope John Paul II knew something that too many of us forget: Jesus didn't address those words only to His apostles or to the popes or other religious leaders who would follow over the centuries. He spoke to anyone who would listen.

There's a wonderful story that Father James Keller, M.M., founder of The Christophers, used to tell. One of his fellow Maryknoll missionaries told him that in the 1920's, on a bitterly cold day in Manchuria, he'd met an old woman dressed in rags and weak with hunger. He brought her to a shelter and gave her a hot meal.

"Why do you bother with me when no one else cares?" she asked.

The priest told her about Jesus Christ and His command to His followers to carry the Good News of salvation to people everywhere and to express His love by helping those most in need.

Then the woman asked, "This Christ - He cannot be long dead."

When the missioner explained that Jesus lived nineteen hundred years before, she exclaimed, "Nineteen hundred years! It was then that He commanded those who followed Him to spread this wonderful idea?"

The priest nodded.

"Then where have His followers been for such a long time?" she asked. "Why haven't they done as He told them to do?"

Why indeed? No pope or priest, minister or missionary can be expected to fulfill Jesus' command if the rest of us do not. And it isn't necessary to travel the world, either. People in our own neighborhoods need mercy, loving-kindness and hope. They need us - you and me - to be pilgrims for God. "Where have His followers been?" We're right here if, like a man named John Paul, we simply take the first step on our journey.

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