It’s a quiet and subdued Divine Mercy Sunday in Poland today. People ask, “How are you?” and what can you say? “Sad. It’s a sad day.” I don’t know if the other people in Mass this morning were struggling as I was to keep tears back.
A True Father
I didn't dare look right or left. I scarcely dared look at the large portrait of John Paul II — strong, healthy, eyes beaming with intelligence, humor and love — that flanked the altar with the image of the Divine Mercy on the other side. When one is in mourning, sometimes one simply has to not think, to numb the mind, in order to keep from breaking down.
It's the first Sunday of the month, and that means exposition and a short period of adoration of the Blessed Sacrament after all Masses today. Our priest reminded us that all the Masses and afternoon adoration would be for the intentions of the Holy Father. “He was to us a true father,” he said, “Let our prayers come to him like the most beautiful, fragrant flowers.” Like many others, I remained after Mass for private prayer and reflection. Now it would be safe to look at that portrait, at the beautiful, kind face of our dear Father. Now it would be safe to cry and mourn. He was indeed a father to us, and his passing is indeed like the loss of a parent.
My thoughts went back to 1990, when my mother died. I was as prepared for her death as I have been for the Holy Father's death. I knew it was inevitable, and yet I did not really face it. I persuaded myself that there was still time, that he would not leave us soon. On Sunday mornings, when Polish television showed live images of the Holy Father, I would find it difficult to watch. He looked so old, so frail. To watch would be to face the inevitable. And like a child facing the loss of a parent, I just couldn't do that.
Last night on television, the newsreader asked a guest, “Isn't it selfish to want the Holy Father to stay with us longer, knowing that he is suffering?” Her guest looked slightly perplexed and replied, “No, it's not so much selfishness as the love of a child, who knows that his father has to leave, and who says, 'Not yet, Papa, not yet. Stay a little while longer.'” Yes, we wanted our Papa to stay a little while longer.
Thinking of these things this morning, I was reminded of my mother's death. She had a good death; she had been anointed and was at peace, ready to go to God. Most of her children were around her in her last hours. I remember her final heart attack, when only the machines told us she was still alive. Two of her daughters-in-law had still not made it to her bedside to say good-bye. Only after they had arrived and could speak to her did she finally fade away. The child who says, “Not yet, Papa, stay a little longer,” knows that in his love, Papa doesn't mind staying a little longer, if it will help us let him go.
Real People Go to Heaven
Before my mother died, I didn't pray. I considered myself Catholic, and I went to Mass — sometimes. But prayer was not part of my life. God the Father, Jesus, Mary, the saints — these were abstract concepts I had learned about in school, and “believed in,” but didn't feel any personal closeness to. When my mother died, I was sure she was in Heaven — whether in Purgatory or enjoying the Beatific Vision I did not know. But I was sure she was in Heaven. And since to me, my mother was a real, flesh-and-blood person whom I had known — unlike all those abstract heavenly beings I had learned about — for several years my mother was the only person in Heaven I prayed to.
Finally, I could tell my mother all the things I had never been able to confide in her during this life. I could tell her how sorry I was for my impatience with her, for my ingratitude, for my lack of filial piety toward her. I could tell her all the pains and sorrows and all the hopes of my heart. I could say all the things I never had the grace or opportunity to tell her while she was in this world.
I never met John Paul II face-to-face, close-up. But during the Eucharistic Congress in Wroclaw in 1997, I was part of a small group who stood under an archway near the town square, waiting for him to appear for a meeting with Alexander Kwasniewski. We waited, rehearsing what we would say to him — “Long live John Paul II! We love you!” — when he appeared. He arrived in the popemobile, looking much smaller than he was in my imagination, and the adults made way for the children to move to the front of the barricade, so they could see the Holy Father and he could bless them. We shouted our greeting, but he didn't hear us — the press were opposite us, and he had to face them for photographs. But President Kwasniewski had seen us, and he told the Holy Father we were waiting, pointing out our little group. He turned to us, we shouted again, and he gave us his blessing. Then he went into the town hall, and I never saw him again so close.
Like many — perhaps most of us — I always wanted to see him again. Seeing images of him greeting pilgrims, laying his hands on the heads of children with a look of love that surely was the image of Christ's love for us, I often thought how wonderful it would be to meet John Paul II in private, to be able to tell him all my hopes and fears and sorrows and ask his prayers, to feel his hands on my head and hear him blessing me. That was very unlikely to happen, and now it never will happen. But this morning in prayer, gazing at his portrait, I realized that something better has happened. Surely, my heart told me, surely, he is in Heaven now. In Heaven he can pray for us all and bless us even more than he could in this life. And if God wills, then he can hear each one of us telling him our hopes and fears and sorrows and asking for his prayers and his blessing.
Tell the Children
It seems inevitable that John Paul II will one day be canonized Pope Saint John Paul the Great. But for that to happen, the Church will require evidence of three miracles granted through the intercession of John Paul II. So this morning after Mass I asked John Paul II to intercede for two situations that I have been praying for for several years, situations that require a miracle. The miracles I asked for are not the sort of thing that the Church is likely to consider as part of John Paul's process of canonization. But I asked him anyway, to let my intentions be among the first miracles he performs on his way to being declared a saint. All those miracles we all pray for — the conversions, the healings, the reconciliations — we can now ask our dear Papa, John Paul II, to grant us those miracles by his intercession.
Friday evening, a friend told me that her 10-year-old son had spent the day weeping uncontrollably at the prospect that the Holy Father might die. I find myself thinking of the very little children who don't understand what's going on, why everyone is so sad, why there's nothing but news on television today. How will we tell them who John Paul was, how much he loved us, and how much we loved him? How will we let the children who are not yet born know what a grace and blessing it was to live during the pontificate of John Paul II?
We will show them pictures and videos; we will share his teaching with them; we will let them see our love as we speak of him. And maybe we will take them on our knees and say to them, “When John Paul died — before he was declared a saint, but right after he died — there was something in our lives that made us very sad, that was a source of great sorrow. And we knew how much he loved us in this life, and that he loved us much more in Heaven. And so we prayed to him and asked him for a miracle. And here's how our prayer was answered…”
© Copyright 2005 Catholic Outreach
Our CE Correspondent in Poland is an American teacher who has lived and worked there for over a decade. She writes anonymously.
