Pope John Paul II is remembered as a great spiritual leader during the 20th century. This past Thursday, George Weigel, a Catholic theologian regarded as one of the nation’s leading public intellectuals, visited campus to discuss Karol Wojtyla’s life and his stature as a saint for the modern world.
Weigel, eloquent in his description of the late pope’s life, said that becoming a saint is something we should all strive toward. Acquiring sanctity is “perfecting who we are as human beings,” he said.
Weigel mentioned that John Paul II was driven to a commitment of Christian discipleship by his experience as a young man, about the age of Colgate students, living in Poland during German occupation in the late1930s and early 1940s. He used the analogy of a “diamond formed in the pressures of the earth” in reference to this formative period in the pope’s life.
Weigel recalled the pontiff’s ability to recognize the dynamism of history and the influence culture has in shaping the world’s path.
He described John Paul II, who served as pope from 1978 until his death at age 84 in 2005, as a man of “faith, hope and charity.” When asked what it was like to eat and talk with the pontiff himself, Weigel laughed and responded that John Paul II would often be the one asking questions, not the other way around.
The experience was, “lots of fun, lots of jokes, but lots of sorrow in the last years. He was in very tough shape physically and that was hard for us who knew him; but [there was] never a dull moment,” Weigel said.
The audience seemed profoundly moved at the end of the talk; a testament to the fact that the life of a noble figure can be appreciated regardless of one’s religious beliefs. The lecture’s emphasis on striving for sanctity in daily life also served as encouragement for students, staff, and faculty to better themselves and their communities.
Weigel’s bestselling novel, Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul the II, was raffled off at the end of the lecture, which was sponsored by the Center for Freedom and Western Civilization and the Newman Society.
Weigel chuckled and observed that he was impressed by the quality of intellectual life at Colgate, saying “usually it’s free food that brings the people, but here it’s free books!”