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Programa de la pelicula sobre Juan Pablo II – con postales queridos Program of the movie about John Paul II – with holy cards Programm des Films über Johannes Paul II – mit “Heiligenbildchen” |
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Mi billete especial My orange ticket Meine orangefarbene Eintrittskarte |
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El actor The actor Der Schauspieler |
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Programa, tapa Cover of the program Titelblatt des Programmheftes |
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Mis Papas My Popes Meine Päpste Fotos: Donnelly © 2005 |
ROME, Simon Donnelly. On Thursday 19 May 2005, I watched a movie with the Holy Father, Benedict. I know that sounds crazy, but through one of the priests in our community I got a ticket to go to the Vatican premier of the film made about the life of Pope John Paul II, entitled: "Karol, a man become pope", by Italian scriptwriter and director, Giacomo Battiato. The film was made in Polish, with mostly Polish actors, but also with a few other nationalities: Italians, Americans, a German and a Canadian. Piotr Adamczyk is Karol Wojtyla.
Late on Thursday afternoon, several thousand of us crowded into the Paul VI Audience Hall: the actors from the film, many Italians, and priests and sisters and brothers and a few bishops, of every description. We sat next to a group of Cistercian monks, here just for the movie. They looked almost uneasy to be out of their monastery, but they were delighted to be here today.
We see his strength, and his humour, and his love.
Finally, in came the living Holy Father, Benedict XVI. We all cheered, then sat down to watch the movie with him. It was long, and very moving. We saw Karol as a young man, with his father during the second World War, Karol as an actor in the secret theatre during the Nazi occupation, Karol as he helped people in the Jewish ghetto, Karol finding his vocation, then as a young priest during the Communist regime in Poland, then as a Bishop, later as a Cardinal, then during the second Vatican Council, and at last as he becomes pope during the conclave of 1978. It is a wonderful thing to see how the filmmakers portray him as a flesh-and-blood human (this is not strictly a biography, nor a hagiography), and also we see Karol’s consistent holiness, his forgiveness of his persecutors, and his deep love for his people. We see the strong cardinal who went into battle with the communist government, but a battle always waged with deep respect for his opponents. Karol’s refusal to openly criticise the government enormously irritated the same government. And this same Cardinal Wojtyla managed to get the church built in what was to be the "worker’s paradise", Nowa Huta. We see his strength, and his humour, and his love.
We applauded…
It was quite amazing, quite surreal, to be sitting with the current pope, in the room with us. At the time of the movie, our new pope was not long a cardinal. He was present during the 1978 conclave. The only man who was portrayed in the film, and who was also in the hall that afternoon, with us, watching the film, was our deceased pope’s secretary, Father—now Archbishop—Stanislaw Dziwisz, who had in fact just said Mass at the tomb of John Paul the previous day, Wednesday 18 May, when our deceased pope would have turned 85. Another man in the film, and also in the vicinity of the Vatican today was the Pope John Paul’s boyhood friend, Jerzy Kluger, who Cardinal Wojtyla thought was dead, but who he meets again in Rome.
Every time we heard Karol Wojtyla say something beautiful in the movie, we applauded loudly (in the Italian way). When he stood up for his oppressed people against the Nazi occupiers, then again under the Communist regime, we applauded! Then we saw the real footage of John Paul II coming out onto the balcony as the new pope, looking so young and strong, smiling onto the square, and we saw him gripping the edge of the balcony, in that way that only he could command an audience, and we heard him speaking to us in his beautiful Slavic-accented Italian. We waited for the moment everyone knows when he said: "Non so se potrò ben spiegarmi nella vostra lingua, la nostra lingua italiana. Se mi sbaglio, se mi sbaglio mi corrigerete", that is: "I do not know if I will be able to express myself properly in your language, our Italian language. If I make a mistake, you will correct me". People here know these words of John Paul so well that we actually spoke them out loud in the movie theatre this afternoon. We all clapped, and wept as we remembered him. We had almost forgotten how young he was in 1978: all the years of sickness and suffering had fallen away again, and we could see him again as he once was. He changed our lives for ever. He has been gone from us only six weeks. But in some ways it feels like a long time already.
Do not be afraid
The film ended with more of John Paul’s opening words to the world: "Do not be afraid!"
After the film was over, we listened to Pope Benedict express his appreciation for the film, and talk about his own memories of the war, and of the time after that. We love our new pope very much, too, and we expressed our delight by both listening to him, and clapping for him. He spoke of the evils of Nazism. It is very poignant to hear our German Pope reflecting on his own experience of the terrible war. When Benedict mentioned Germany, we all clapped loudly. It was clear that we wanted him to know how much we love him and love Germany too.
The actors came up to meet the new Pope. He lingered, speaking to them, and speaking to some others. After a little while longer, he walked out of the hall, and left us to ourselves.
And then we walked slowly out into the Roman night. Later, on the number 40 bus heading towards Termini Station, with many religious sisters, and other moviegoers, we exchanged memories. An Italian woman next to us reminisced: "I remember him when he was still Cardinal Wojtyla. He was strong and handsome". Finally, we got off our bus to enjoy part of the 40 hours Eucharistic adoration at Santa Maria Maggiore. This is still the Eucharistic year proclaimed by John Paul II. So, the subject of the movie and the real Pope were connected yet again for us that evening.