Pope remembered as 20th century giant

Pope John Paul II

Pope John Paul II is dead at 84.

The announcement of his passing was distributed to journalists by e-mail.

"The Holy Father died this evening at 9:37 p.m. (2:37 p.m. EST) in his private apartment. All the procedures outlined in the apostolic Constitution 'Universi Dominici Gregis' that was written by John Paul II on Feb. 22, 1996, have been put in motion," wrote papal spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls.

The pontiff's passing followed heart and kidney failure after two recent hospitalizations. He was responsive to members of the papal household until hours before his death, the Vatican reports.

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Karol Wojtyla is mourned today as the beloved pastor to 1 billion Catholics worldwide and a giant figure of the 20th century who helped defeat communism, advance human rights and affirm traditional moral values as they came under increasing attack.

Born in Wadowice, Poland, near Krakow, he became the first non-Italian leader of the Catholic Church in 455 years in 1978.

Catholics regarded him as the 264th successor of St. Peter, the disciple of Jesus.

At age 58, he was the youngest pope for more than a century.

Wojtyla's father was a non-commissioned officer in the Polish army. His mother died in 1929, when he was 8 and his only sibling, a brother, died when Wojtyla was 12.

When the Nazis invaded Poland in 1939, the future pope left studies at the university in Krakow to escape death or deportation, taking up a job in a quarry. His father died in 1941, the only remaining member of his immediate family.

Under Nazi occupation, Wojtyla studied secretly for the priesthood with the Krakow cardinal after the seminaries were closed.

He was ordained in 1946, at age 26, and became Poland's youngest bishop at 38.

In 1964, he became Archbishop of Krakow. Three years later, Pope Paul VI made him a cardinal.

On Oct. 16, 1978, Wojtyla was elected pope, beginning what became the third-longest pontificate in the Roman Catholic Church's history.

One of his legacies undoubtedly will be his worldwide travels, taking him to nearly 130 countries. More people are believed to have seen him in person than any other figure in world history.

His 104 foreign trips have taken him the equivalent of 30 times around the circumference of the earth.

According to the Vatican website, in Italy alone, more than 17 million people have attended his weekly addresses since 1978.

His significant international impact began soon after election, when his mediation helped prevent a war between Argentina and Chile. His opposition to communism is regarded as a key factor in the revolutions that swept Eastern Europe, including his homeland Poland, in the late 1980s.

The pope supported the Solidarity labor movement that led to Poland's freedom from Soviet dominance, triggering a domino effect that eventually brought down every regime in the Soviet bloc.

President Reagan's 'partner in the struggle against communism.'

John Paul II was President Reagan's "partner in the struggle against communism," said George Cecala, Catholic and Communications Director of RightMarch.com, a group placing memorial ads in newspapers in remembrance of the pope.

"He recognized the brutal nature of the totalitarian system and saw the power of faith as the means to free people from its grip," Cecala said. "Truly, his eminence was freedom's friend and an advocate for peaceful solutions to problems ailing mankind."

Solidarity movement founder Lech Walesa recalled the power of John Paul's 1979 visit to Warsaw when the pope ended Mass with the words that became a rallying cry, to "renew the face of the Earth."

"We know what the pope has achieved. Fifty percent of the collapse of communism is his doing," Walesa told the Associated Press. "More than one year after he spoke these words, we were able to organize 10 million people for strikes, protests and negotiations.

"Earlier we tried, I tried, and we couldn't do it. These are facts. Of course, communism would have fallen, but much later and in a bloody way. He was a gift from the heavens to us."

In 1981, John Paul survived an assassination attempt believed to have been engineered by communist Bulgaria and the Soviet Union. Later, he inspired the world when he met with the Turkish attacker, Mehmet Ali Agca, and offered forgiveness.

Pope meets with would-be assassin Mehmet Ali Agca

In an Istanbul prison cell Friday, Agca said he was praying for his "brother," according to his lawyer, the Times of London reported.

The pontiff also became known for addressing age-old divisions and for urging wealthy nations to aid the poor and hungry. In March 2000, he visited the Holy Land where he left a personal note in a crack in the Western Wall, asking Jews to forgive the church's past sins against them.

Some of his 14 encyclicals – authoritative papal writings – stirred controversy both within and outside the church as he firmly held fast to opposition to premarital sex, abortion, female priests and marriage for priests.

Many Catholic scholars believe his unwavering stance on moral issues saved the church from the dramatic loss of membership experienced by U.S. mainline Protestant denominations, which have moved with cultural tides on issues such as homosexuality.

One of the leading Catholic lay groups opposed to John Paul on many issues, such as female priests and homosexuality, nevertheless, praised him Friday him as a pope who left "an indelible mark on the history of recent decades."

"His uncompromising calls for justice and peace continued the tradition of papal challenge to power and wealth," said Linda Pieczynski, national spokeswomon for Call to Action.

But Pieczynski said "within the Roman Catholic Church his reign was characterized by Vatican domination of church government and procedure. Ina a time of frequent turmoil and uncertainty the Catholic Church has unquestionably been helped by his strength and deep personal piety, but some its energy and creativity have also been limited by the authoritative culture of the Vatican during recent decades."

She hoped the new pope would fulfill the "progressive mandate of Vatican II and with fearless openness to 'the signs of the times.'"

Church historian Eamon Duffy observes that in judging John Paul's legacy, critics and admirers likely will cite the same evidence.

Writing in the international Catholic weekly newspaper The Tablet, Duffy said, "The tireless journeys which have made him the best-known face on the planet seem to some the self-immolation of a man consumed with evangelistic zeal and pastoral concern for all mankind – Peter strengthening his brethren."

He added: "To others, they have distorted a healthy church order by the cult of celebrity, focusing the church round a consummate populist, reviving an essentially 19th-century ultramontane understanding of the pope as absolute, and in the process infantilizing the laity and marginalizing the bishops."

In recent years, the pope has received criticism from across the ideological spectrum for not doing enough to address the devastating priest abuse scandal.

In his youth, Wojtyla was known as "God's athlete, but in 1993, he began showing signs of Parkinson's disease, eventually impairing his speech and posture.

His health took a turn for the worse earlier this year, and Feb. 24 he underwent throat surgery, the beginning of a sharp decline.

Yet in his final weeks, his suffering also became a source of inspiration and teaching, as many saw in him a demonstration of the grace of Christ.