Today is the Feast of Blessed John XXIII, and also the 45th anniversary of the opening of Vatican II, his unexpected "opening the windows" for the Church. A few years ago I translated a small book (actually a kind of photo album) on the life of Good Pope John. It's not slated for publication yet, but it's ready when we are! At any rate, one of the interesting things about Pope John's life is that in his "career" as a Vatican diplomat, he could not exactly have been called a success. (Not by the usual standards according to which diplomats are judged!) He ruffled so many feathers that he ended up sent to places where the Catholic Church was weakest in terms of the local culture. Perhaps it was thought that Angelo Roncalli could have little impact in such places as Bulgaria and Turkey. Then he was taken out of the diplomatic corps entirely! What happened, though, was that he made a lasting impact in those parts of the world, opening avenues of greater communication with the Holy See. The diplomat nobody wanted became the Pope everybody loved.
God's ways are certainly not ours!
Thursday, October 11, 2007
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1 comment:
Thanks for that little memory of Good Pope John...my favorite. When I was in Rome even the Lutherans wanted to pray at his grave...so we made a pilgrimage..."The stone that the builders rejected...." What a smile! Thanks again.
Deacon Fred
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