Vatican Releases John Paul II's Spiritual Testament
The Vatican released the text of the spiritual testament of John Paul II yesterday, five days after the passing of one of the longest-serving and most contentious figures in papal history.
The Vatican released the text of the spiritual testament of John Paul II yesterday, five days after the passing of one of the longest-serving and most traveled popes in history.
The text, which was released in an Italian translation of the original Polish, was also translated from Italian into English by the Vatican.
“I desire to follow Him, and I desire that everything making up part of my earthly life should prepare me for this moment,” John Paul II stated in a testament written on Mar. 6, 1979.
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The testament, which also included successive additions, asked everyone for their forgiveness and their prayer “that the Mercy of God may appear greater than my weakness and unworthiness.”
John Paul II, who served as the spiritual leader for the world’s 1 billion Roman Catholics for 26 years, died Saturday night in his private apartment at the age of 84 after suffering heart failure brought on by two months of acute breathing problems and other infections.
The late pontiff also suffered from a number of chronic illnesses, including crippling hip and knee ailments and Parkinson's disease—a progressive neurological disorder that can make breathing difficult.
In an entry added between Feb. 24 and Mar. 1, 1980, John Paul II said “I wish to entrust myself totally to the Lord’s grace.
“He Himself will decide when and how I must end my earthly life and pastoral ministry,” the pontiff wrote.
“Accepting that death, even now, I hope that Christ will give me the grace for the final passage, in other words (my) Easter. I also hope that He makes (that death) useful for this more important cause that I seek to serve—the salvation of men and women, the safeguarding of the human family and, in that, of all nations and all peoples (among them, I particularly address my earthly Homeland), and useful for the people with whom He particularly entrusted me, for the question of the Church, for the glory of God Himself.”
In reflecting on the May 1981 assassination attempt in St. Peter’s Square, John Paul said, “Divine Providence saved me in a miraculous way from death.”
“The One Who is the Only Lord of life and death Himself prolonged my life, in a certain way He gave it to me again,” the pontiff stated in his final entry dated for Mar. 12-18, 2000. “From that moment [my life] belonged to Him even more. I hope He will help me to recognize up to what point I must continue this service to which I was called on October 16, 1978.
“I ask him to call me back when He Himself wishes. 'In life and in death we belong to the Lord ... we are the Lord's’,” John Paul continued, citing Romans 14:8. “I also hope that, as long as I am called to fulfill the Petrine service in the Church, the Mercy of God will give me the necessary strength for this service.”
In his concluded remarks, John Paul said, “As the end of my life approaches I return with my memory to the beginning, to my parents, to my brother, to the sister (I never knew because she died before my birth), to the parish in Wadowice, where I was baptized, to that city I love, to my peers, friends from elementary school, high school and the university, up to the time of the occupation when I was a worker, and then in the parish of Niegowic, then St. Florian's in Krakow, to the pastoral ministry of academics, to the milieu of....to all milieux....to Krakow and to Rome....to the people who were entrusted to me in a special way by the Lord.
“To all I want to say just one thing: ‘May God reward you.’
“‘In manus tuas, Domine, commendo spiritum meum.’”
Today at 10 a.m. (4 a.m. EST), the funeral Mass for John Paul II will be celebrated in St. Peter's Square, as announced earlier this week by the Vatican. The funeral is expected to draw up to 4 million people, including heads of state from around the world. Under Vatican tradition, Friday is the latest the funeral could have been held.
