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Karol Józef
Wojtyla was born on May 18, 1920, in Wadowice, Poland.
The youngest child of a schoolteacher and a retired army officer,
he was an active young man, an athlete and an outdoorsman
whose passions were poetry, philosophy, and theater. Much
of his advanced education was obtained underground after the
Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939. He was ordained a priest
in 1946, a bishop in 1958, was appointed archbishop of Kraków
in 1964, and elevated to the College of cardinals in 1967,
at forty-seven its youngest member. When Cardinal Wojtyla
was elected the 264th successor of Peter in 1978, he became
the youngest pope since Pius IX a hundred years before, the
first Polish pope, and the first non-Italian pontiff since
Adrian IV in the sixteenth century. John Paul II circled the
globe, logging over a million miles and visiting every continent
except Antarctica. He opened dialogues with Protestant denominations;
visited Auschwitz, a Jewish synagogue, and a Muslim mosque;
and made pilgrimages to Orthodox countries where no pope had
ever set foot before. His legacy to the Church includes more
than a dozen encyclicals, as well as scores of apostolic letters,
constitutions, and exhortations. He beatified and canonized
more than a thousand men and women from all walks of life
and greeted hundreds of millions of the faithful through his
travels and papal audiences. He was tireless in his work for
the poor and powerless, speaking out against war, economic
injustice, political oppression, and what he called the industrialized
world's culture of death. Pope John Paul II's ultimate homily
was probably his own life-a life characterized by a charismatic
personality, heartfelt prayer, moral vision, global evangelism,
tireless advocacy for human dignity and political and religious
freedom, and unshakable faith.
Listed below
are several links to sites honoring the life of Pope John
Paul II
The
Official Vatican Website
Archdiocese
of St. Paul and Mpls. Web-Site
Catholic
Spirit
EWTN
Pope
John Paul II Culture Center, Washington DC
PBS
Frontline
Video
Tribute Remembering Pope John Paul II
Video
Tribute by Daughters of St. Paul
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