The legacy of John Paul II

[Dilettante]

John Paul II has just died, and as one billion Catholics mourn (perhaps especially in Poland, where he was seen as a sort of national hero against communism) many people are starting to reflect and trying to come up with a summary of his efferct on the world. Perhaps it's too early for a balanced assessment, but I was wondering how other people in the forum see the overall legacy of JP II. He was such an active leader and he traveled so extensively that he must have had an impact on history.

[ST88]

John Paul II has just died, and as one billion Catholics mourn (perhaps especially in Poland, where he was seen as a sort of national hero against communism) many people are starting to reflect and trying to come up with a summary of his efferct on the world. Perhaps it's too early for a balanced assessment, but I was wondering how other people in the forum see the overall legacy of JP II. He was such an active leader and he traveled so extensively that he must have had an impact on history.

While it's true that he helped bring down Communism (capital C, not small c) -- I think he sent some kind of communication to Brezhnev about sending troops into Poland -- he still espoused admiration for some Marxist ideals.

Very few people have considered just how much this Pope has learned from Marx. For example, he has adopted a view of alienation from the early Marx that is without antecedent in the doctrine of the Church. Through his philosophical work in the 1950s, 60s and 70s, Wojtyla rediscovered the Augustinian roots of the category of alienation in Marx. This concept of alienation helped him explain the paradox of "atheistic humanism" as the drama of people severed from an essential dimension of their being - the Absolute - and thus confronted with the worst diminution of their being.

Also, very few people consider that in Laborem Exercens we see for the first time a truly sympathetic view from the Church toward the workers movement. This is important because many Catholic intellectuals, especially the liberation theologians, believe that the Church, in order to stay with the workers, must accept much of Marx.
Rocco Buttiglione - John Paul II: The Post-Modern Pope

One of his biggest rails was against capitalism and the way that materialism was affecting morals. I see now this is being politically spun as some kind of first-world guilt towards dictators in the third world.

When communism was first proposed in the 19th century, one of the first criticisms was from the religious sector about trying to create a Utopia, a "Heaven on Earth" when there was only one Heaven. I think the phrase is "secular messianism".

The main problem with the Communist bloc, however, wasn't the anti-capitalist state that many in the U.S. would like to think it was. Its main problem was tyranny and totalitarianism, and that is what this Pope helped to bring down. Communism by itself was never a threat to the Pope, but the tyranny that the USSR (Communist in name only) presented on states like Poland did pose a threat.

Unfortunately, I think this will be lost to history as an ironic footnote to John-Paul II's career as Pope. The forces of capitalism have already co-opted him as the anti-communist crusader that he never was.

He helped to reconcile Christianity with Jews (or, more specifically, Catholicism with Jews), though he utterly failed to do so with other religions (and the non-religious). And by actively promoting the most socially conservative ideas of the Bible, he managed to create an informal -- but very real -- schism with American Catholics and many Catholics in Western Europe. American Catholics in particular seem to feel that the Pope doesn't really speak for them. According to a 1998 study at The University of Chicago, 82% of Catholics identify themselves as non "pro-life"; 67% favor capital punishment; 49% said that homosexuality is not "always wrong"; 79% said that pre-marital sex was not "always wrong"; 70% favor euthanasia; and 57% say that teenagers should have access to birth control even if their parents don't approve. These are all issues that he has spoken out about often.

The Vatican has managed to position the Pope as the moral conscience of the world, not just a spokesperson or a supreme leader of the Catholic Church. John Paul II took full advantage of this and managed to propose the Catholic voice as the moral conscience of the world.

[The Happy Humanist]

As an atheist and humanist, I have to admit to being somewhat in awe of the man as a person. Perhaps he was just a terrific actor (and he was an actor), but his basic persona did bring across an aura of serenity, humility, and love for his fellow man. As Tom Leykis, a famous atheist and pope-basher put it after John Paul's visit to Phoenix, "I can't hate this man. There's nothing to hate. He appears to be the real thing."

Let the academics go back and forth on what his political leanings were, or what direction he took the church in. John Paul's true legacy is the towering figure he portrayed to the world, the joy he brought a billion catholics, and the examples he set in life - visiting and forgiving his assassin comes to mind - and in death.

I would admonish my fellow atheists to stow the pope-bashing, at least just for this week.* It's extremely distasteful, it's tilting at windmills, and it reflects extremely poorly on us, making it seem as if we are reduced to sniping at the heels of one of history's most beloved humans. As to his social conservatism and his prudishness, my gosh, that's his job! He is but one of a line of 260-some odd popes, do you think he can turn 1700 years of church teaching on its ear single-handedly? We're dealing with church dogma, which by definition cannot change, certainly not at the whim of a pontiff, who after all, is not really a leader but a servant of God. He had to reaffirm church teachings in these regards. Again, that's what Popes do!

So as an atheist, I think as Popes go, this one's been OK.

==JJS==

* I refer here not to anyone on this forum but in various other fora I've visited recently.

[Dilettante]

Thanks, ST88 and Happy Humanist. As always, your responses are intelligent, well-informed, and insightful.

I agree that this Pope was in many ways paradoxical. He did try to speak as the moral conscience of the world (perhaps inevitably so, since, after all, "catholic" means "universal") and his figure has been co-opted by everyone, not just capitalists but also communists and anti-globalists (interestingly, Castro has decreed three days of national mourning in Cuba!). At the time of the huge antiwar demonstrations the Communist Party in my country proposed him for a Peace prize (perhaps they didn't know that the Pope is barred from accepting any worldly awards). He was also the first media-wise Pope.

Perhaps because he had been involved in theater groups in his youth in Poland, he was not afraid of appearing in public and reaching out to people. Most, if not all, previous Popes had been typically "ivory tower" types, while this one traveled extensively, especially to places where no Pope had set foot before, like Africa and Spanish America (I mean Latin America).

It doesn't surprise me if he took elements from Marx because he had a degree in Philosophy. As a footnote, liberal politics in general were never extraneous to catholicism, since it was the Catholic theologians of the School of Salamanca in the 16th century here in Spain who first produced a coherent formulation of notions such as human rights, freedom from state coercion, and the legitimacy of overthrowing a tyrant. This is a little known fact perhaps because later the Enlightenement philosophers did the same (this time on a secular basis) and totally eclipsed them.

I think, however, that when people portray thge Pope as an anti-communist crusader they are thinking of the scene which took place at the Managua airport, when he was seen scolding Father Ernesto Cardenal, then a minister in the Sandinista revolutionary government. John Paul II firmly believed that it was wrong for a priest to hold political office. He did criticize some forms of communism and some (not all) forms of capitalism. If you read "Sollicitudo Rei Socialis" side by side with "Centessimus Annus" you'll see that, while the first seems to condemn capitalism, the second approves of it on condition that a certain fairness and the rule of law are present. Ultimately, Soviet communism would have collapsed sooner or later because of its tremendous inner contradictions, but the Pope helped speed up that process. I'm not at all sure that communism could exist without a tyrannical state, however. Anarchist experiments (such as the ones in my country in the 1930s) are always short-lived, and markets and democracy seem to fit together (although you can have a despotic government and some capitalism, as in China). But I'm going off topic here.

Ironically none of the media pundits I have heard even touched on theological or religious topics when discussing the figure of the Pope. They all draw attention to his "championing peace" or "freedom", but nobody seems to have read the encyclicals.

It will be interesting to see who is elected now. Many are rooting for an Italian Pope, because Italians are supposed to be better at diplomacy ("non manca finessa") and at reconciling very different positions inside the Church. The Catholic Church is direct heir to the Roman Empire (I say this with admiration, since, as Goethe reportedly said, "he who cannot draw upon three thousand years is living from hand to mouth"). I may disagree with the Vatican on many things, but the Pope commanded infinitely more respect from me than your average TV preacher.

To sum up, a very sincere man and a thoroughly "human" Pope.

[Corvus]

As an atheist and humanist, I have to admit to being somewhat in awe of the man as a person. Perhaps he was just a terrific actor (and he was an actor), but his basic persona did bring across an aura of serenity, humility...

Yet not nearly as humble as Pope John Paul I, the first pope to use "I" in his speech instead of the "we", the first pope to refuse the sedia gestatoria and the first pope to refuse the crowning ceremony and the papal tiara. Though, like his successor, a social conservative, he was willing to concede to the possibility of being wrong, privately expressing some reservations of the Church's stance on contraceptives and frightening the Vatican when he attended a UN conference on overpopulation in third world countries and expressed a certain consideration for it. Unfortunately, he died 33 days after taking the crown (or funny hat-thing. Mitre, isn't it?). God, or some people in the Vatican as some people would have us believe, did not approve of his papal reign. So saying, I do not see Pope John Paul II as an example of humility, nor of arrogance, but of conviction; a word I do write in any pejorative sense, for his conviction had the all the serenity of humility. This conviction, this trust in his faith, was a beacon for catholics. He was the most widely travelled pope ever, visiting mosques and praying at the Wailing Wall. He was incredibly diplomatic, and, as previous posters have pointed out, very human, meeting people as equals, holding audiences with musicians and even recording his own album (which, let's face it, isn't very good, but it's still a sign of very down to earth pope who desired to reach people).

People speak of John Paul II as the pope beloved of the youth, which is very strange for such a vigorous social conservative who staunchly opposed abortion, homosexuality and contraception. But we would tolerate in a pope what we would not tolerate in a world leader, and where we would condemn as a vice these sorts of potentially destructive social policies if enacted in law, and the gross expenditure involved in the pope's extensive journeying - reportedly more than all previous popes combined - if we saw it in a head of state, we praise Pope John Paul II for it. The beauty of popes - particularly in non-catholic nations - is that one does not have to live with them. This is especially true of the one I am discussing.

But then, what I see as bad in a pope, is what might command respect in a catholic (or even protestant) and combined with the conviction of his faith, his personableness, his humanity and his desire to reach out to people and the way he lived, without hypocrisy, the Christian ideals he represented - like the excellent example of forgiving his assassin - could cause him to be considered as the very image of what a pope should be.

[The Happy Humanist]

I did not know those things about John Paul I. Very interesting. True, JPII was not without controversy, but boy, oh, boy, what a figure he cut. For one thing, he just struck me as someone who was born to be Pope, who had all the right moves, the right look...if you called Central Casting and asked for an actor who could play a Pontiff, they'd send you Karol Wojtyla.

Yes, the funny-hat-thingy is called a Mitre. Interestingly, it is the hat depicted in ancient drawings of Mithras....from which its name derives!

[ST88]

As to his social conservatism and his prudishness, my gosh, that's his job! He is but one of a line of 260-some odd popes, do you think he can turn 1700 years of church teaching on its ear single-handedly? We're dealing with church dogma, which by definition cannot change, certainly not at the whim of a pontiff, who after all, is not really a leader but a servant of God. He had to reaffirm church teachings in these regards. Again, that's what Popes do!

Have to disagree here. Church dogma and tradition is by definition changeable, at least for Catholics. It's the Bible that's immutable. Catholic teachings have changed throughout history. Papal infallibility, for example, has only been around since the 1800s.

And, yes, it's the Pope's job to promote the teachings of his church, but he chooses which parts to emphasize. JP II emphasized beatification and miracles, for example, rather than a personal relationship with the church. He was particularly focused on issues surrounding sex and the "essence" of life. He did not emphasize purgatory or Mary or many other "extra-worldly" aspects of being a Christian. His focus was largely on the here and now: e.g., peace between nations, sex as a Holy act.

[Vladd44]

Sic Semper Tyrannus

[Dilettante]

Sic Semper Tyrannus

Latine loqueris? Do you mean that the Pope was a tyrant? Just out of curiosity, in what ways do you think he was tyrannical? Surely he hardly had any temporal power, and the people who accepted his spiritual authority did so mostly of their own free will (nobody is forced to be Catholic any more these days).

[Vladd44]

It is very presumptuous to believe all of those affected by a pope to be voluntary subjects. The catholic church has great influence in many regions of the world.

The catholic church's views on birth control has adversely affected many women who are not catholic. This has affected governmental policy and that which is defined as socially acceptable behavior in many areas of the world (Central/South America as examples). The wish to deny basic reproductive freedoms causes me to view the catholic church as an anti-women organization.

Even stipulating peoples right to belong to any church or not, it is difficult to ignore the actions of the church againsts it's members/victims. To coerce others to follow you in fear for their eternal soul is nothing less that tyranny. I am unwilling to believe that the fact that its voluntary allows the organization to do whatever they wish. I hope that most of us on both sides of the fence would agree that the Heavens Gate cult and others of their ilk are extreme examples of overstepping their bounds. And I would dare say that the birth control views of the catholic church has affected far more people than that cult could ever have dreamed of.