It is a tribute to the stamina and vision of Pope John Paul II that he could make the spiritual pilgrimage of his life to the Holy Land, retracing the paths Jesus trod to forge Christianity, and manage to inspire Jews and Muslims with his examples of brotherhood and reconciliation in a land grown bitter with worldly divisions.
One can justly marvel at the iron will of the pontiff, ailing and bowed at 79, who completed Sunday a physically grueling journey through six days, nine towns and cities and 14 major addresses. And one can also admire his steely calm, rising above the fray when Israeli and Palestinian officials laid claim in his presence to exclusive rights to Jerusalem as their capital. The pope made it clear that the Holy City belongs to no one group, but to all faithful Christians, Jews and Muslims who trace their common roots to the patriarch Abraham.
Yet it was his eloquent appeal for reconciliation and his ability to lament the wrongs committed by his church–without diminishing the dignity of the church–that powerfully elevated this spiritual mission to the sublime.
The vicar of Christ waded into the morass of Middle Eastern politics and reaffirmed his status as a peacemaker and one of the world’s moral authorities in a manner that befitted his leadership of 1 billion Roman Catholics.
At the Mount of Beatitudes–where Jesus is said in the Gospel of St. Matthew to have declared, “Blessed are the peacemakers”–the pontiff warned a youthful multitude of some 100,000 Christians gathered above the Sea of Galilee against the paths of war, violence and deceit.
At the Western Wall, the holiest shrine of Judaism, the pope put a prayer in the ancient Herodian stones asking forgiveness for those who caused Jews to suffer over the ages. In a Palestinian refugee camp near Bethlehem, he reaffirmed the Vatican’s long-held support for the Palestinians’ “natural right to a homeland.”
That these occasions were historic is obvious, not least because of the immense interest they generated among people of different faiths around the globe. What was less obvious, and perhaps more enduring, was the great weight that such profound gestures by the pontiff could have in a land torn asunder by so many inhumane actions taken by the faithful in the name of God.
Christians found hope in the pope’s presence in a stony land where their numbers are steadily diminishing. Jews had hoped for a more specific apology for the Holocaust, but Israelis in general were gladdened by the pope’s actions, including his visit to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial. Muslims found solace in the pontiff’s endorsement of their most basic right to a state of their own. The personal spiritual odyssey of John Paul II, on his 91st international trip, is an example of brotherhood for others to follow.
