Beatification
Events of late which have drawn the attention of the world; a royal marriage in Britain, and at Vatican City the beatification of Pope John Paul II, by his successor, Pope Benedict XVI. The three-hour beatification ceremony certainly matched in pomp and ceremony, albeit not of a temporal, but a spiritual context, that of the Royal House of Windsor wedding.Where excitement, romance and a fairy-tale atmosphere prevailed in London, hushed reverence and spiritual uplifting accompanied the ceremony at St.Peter's Basilica. One and a half million people are said to have attended at St.Peter's Square; difficult to fathom the possibility of that many people gathering anywhere, for any ceremonial pomp and display.
The Vatican experts accepted that Pope John Paul's godliness was evident in his having been responsible for the miraculous recovery of a French nun diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. John Paul reached out from the grave to magnanimously grant the nun the blessing of a cure, and that is simply miraculous, without a doubt.
Ministrations such as his are urgently required in many places all around the world, where people suffer grave and injurious hardships due to the onset of morbid diseases shortening their lives. And a second miracle is being sought to affirm, confirm and confer sainthood upon this man whose spiritual journey was so remarkable and who had attained such an elite height in the world of faith.
His was a reign of hope and vigorous presentation; a travelling, visiting pope. His vigor was interrupted briefly by a horribly misguided attempt by a lunatic to sever Pope John Paul from this life and usher him into the next, but the pope prevailed to live out his venerable life span. Unable to save himself from the miserable ravages of Parkinson's, but he saved another.
Pope John Paul presided over the collapse, as it were, of the 'evil empire', the already-moribund Soviet Union, with his support of the Polish Solidarity movement. Unlike a certain predecessor who feared to enrage the Nazi tide by supporting the European Jewish community's desperate wish to escape a monumental, all-embracing death plan.
In recognition of his holiness, blood was taken from Pope John Paul, and set aside for a future blessing as a reliquary; an precious object of veneration. Catholics by the hundreds of thousands filed silently into the cathedral to view John Paul's coffin. Paying their quiet respects to a man who dominated their faithful lives for many years.
Not present were the many Roman Catholics whose lives were destroyed by the priests who ravaged them as children. Whom the Church defended by giving them shelter from the storm of protests, while thundering against the sins of homosexuality, birth control and euthanasia. The priests and the bishops who shielded them from scandal still children of the Church.
In good company with another devoted child of the Church who was also in attendance, despite his stature on the world stage as a tyrannical human-rights abuser, a murderer and one who destroyed his country's future. One might think that Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe, mingling among royalty and heads of state, would represent a candidate suitable for excommunication.
One would be wrong.
Labels: Human Relations, Human Rights, Political Realities, Religion
posted by Pieface @ Monday, May 02, 2011
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