'Be not afraid'

Last Wednesday, Pope Benedict XVI commemorated the third anniversary of Pope John Paul II's death. Who does not vividly remember those dramatic days and hours when the world stood still hoping against hope that John Paul II would survive? Time flies and while the dramatic pictures remain fixed in our minds, words tend to fly quickly.

On the day of his election to the papacy in 1978, John Paul II had advised us: "Be not afraid." Pope Benedict quite rightly reminded us of those words, adding that throughout his pontificate, John Paul II acted on those words "with unbending firmness - at first while carrying his bishop's staff with its cross, and later, when his physical strength was waning, almost while supporting himself on it, until that final Good Friday in which he participated in the Way of the Cross from his private chapel, holding the cross in his arms". John Paul II's final suffering, he said, "revealed to believers, and to the whole world, the secret of an entire Christian life".

Pope John Paul lived through the horrors of World War II, the communist dictatorship and several personal tragedies, including the attempt on his own life. But he still showed the attitude expressed in his quotation from the Gospels: "Be not afraid." Pope Benedict said the Church today must carry on bearing witness to the hope that John Paul II had offered and "continue in her evangelising mission, faithfully and without compromise, tirelessly spreading Christ's merciful love".

Mgr Slawomir Oder, the priest in charge of promoting the cause of the former Pope's beatification announced last Monday on Vatican Radio that he had completed a 2,000-page draft of the positio, the official position paper explaining why John Paul II should be proclaimed a saint. Mgr Oder said that an official at the Congregation for Saints' Causes is examining the draft, and after a few adjustments are made, the report would be submitted for judgment. Among those present for the conference held earlier this week at the Vatican was Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz of Krakow, who had served as Pope John Paul's secretary for almost 40 years, who said he continues to receive hundreds of letters from people who have asked for Pope John Paul's intercession.

However a recent Polish survey conducted among 1,000 people found that although 63 per cent prayed for his beatification and 31 per cent reported that they had returned to the faith thanks to John Paul II, there was much less support for positions he took in support of Church teaching on certain controversial issues - just 15 per cent rejected the use of artificial contraception, and only 26 per cent condemned abortion under all circumstances.