c. 2005 Religion News Service
VATICAN CITY _ Excerpts from the will of Pope John Paul II, made public Thursday (April 7). The translation is unofficial and some punctuation has been changed:
March 3, 1979
“`Keep awake therefore for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming.’ (Matthew 24:42). These words remind me of the last call that will happen in the moment the Lord wishes. I want to follow him, and I want all that is part of my earthly life to prepare me for this moment. I do not know when it will come, but like everyone, I put this moment too into the hands of the Mother of my Master: Totus Tuus (Entirely Yours). In the same maternal hands I leave everyone and all those who have linked my life and my vocation. In these hands I leave above all the church and also my nation and all of humanity. I thank everyone. I ask pardon from everyone. I also ask prayer that the mercy of God is greater than my weakness and unworthiness.”
“I do not leave behind any property to be disposed of. As to the things of everyday use that served me, I ask that they be distributed as appears opportune. My personal notes should be burned. I ask that Don Stanislao (Dziwisz, his secretary) supervise this, and thank him for the collaboration and aid so prolonged over the years and so comprehensive. All the other thanks I leave in my heart before God because it is difficult to express them.”
Feb. 23-March 1, 1980
“The times in which we live are unspeakably difficult and unquiet. The path of the church also has become difficult and tense (with) trials characteristic of these times, both for the faithful and for the pastors. The church is in a period of such persecution, not less than that of the first centuries, even exceeding it in the degree of ruthlessness and hatred. Sanguis martyrum _ semen christianorum (blood of martyrs _ seed of Christianity). And beyond this, so many people die innocently, also in this country in which we live.”
March 12-18, 2000
“According to the designs of Providence, it has been given to me to live in the difficult century that is now passing, and now in the year in which I will be 80 (`octogesima adveniens’ _ 80th approaches) I must ask myself if it is not the time to repeat with the Biblical Simeon `Nunc dimittis (now dismiss).’
“On the day of May 13, 1981, the day of the attempt against the pope during the general audience in St. Peter’s Square, Divine Providence saved me from death in a miraculous way. The one who is the only Lord of life and of death, he himself prolonged this life (and) in a certain way gave it to me anew. From this moment it belonged still more to him. I hope that he will help me to recognize how long I must continue this service to which I was called on Oct. 16, 1978. I ask him to recall me when he himself wishes. `In life and in death we belong to the Lord … we are of the Lord (Romans 14:8).’ I hope also that as long as I will carry out the Petrine service in the church, the mercy of God will lend me the force necessary for this service.”
“The last decade of the past century was free of the preceding tensions; although this does not signify that it did not carry with it new problems and difficulties. In a special way may Divine Providence be praised for this, that the period of the so-called Cold War ended without violence nuclear conflict, the danger that had weighed on the world in the earlier period.”
“ … I wish once again to express gratitude to the Holy Spirit for the great gift of the Second Vatican Council, to which together with the entire church _ and above all with the entire episcopate _ I feel indebted. I am convinced that new generations will continue to draw from the richness of this country of the 20th century and broaden it.”
KRE/RB END POLK
