The Venerable Pope John Paul II (Latin: Ioannes Paulus PP. II, Italian: Giovanni Paolo II, Polish: Jan Paweł II) 18 May 1920 – 2 April 2005, born Karol Józef Wojtyła

John Paul II has been acclaimed as one of the most influential leaders of the 20th century. It is widely held that he was instrumental in ending Communism in his native Poland and eventually all of Europe.

John Paul II apologised to Jews, Galileo, women, victims of the Inquisition, Muslims killed by the Crusaders, and almost everyone who had suffered at the hands of the Catholic Church through the years. Even before he became the Pope, he was a prominent editor and supporter of initiatives like the Letter of Reconciliation of the Polish Bishops to the German Bishops from 1965.

As Pope, he officially made public apologies for over 100 of these wrongdoings, including:

▪ The legal process on the Italian scientist and philosopher Galileo Galilei, himself a devout Catholic, around 1633 (31 October 1992).

▪ Catholics' involvement with the African slave trade (9 August 1993).

▪ The Church Hierarchy's role in burnings at the stake and the religious wars that followed the Protestant Reformation (May 1995, in the Czech Republic).

▪ The injustices committed against women, the violation of women's rights and for the historical denigration of women (10 July 1995, in a letter to "every woman").

▪ The inactivity and silence of many Catholics during the Holocaust (see the article Religion in Nazi Germany) (16 March 1998)

"The future starts today, not tomorrow," Pope John Paul ll

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Karol Wojtyla was a young parish priest in Dabrowa. He was approached by a devout Catholic Mrs Jachowicz to have a Jewish child in her care baptised. On hearing that a child had been entrusted into her care by the parents prior to deportation, he refused to perform the baptismal ceremony as there was hope that once the war was over, that his relatives might take him.

Shachne Hiller not only survived the war, but was eventually reunited with his relatives in the United States. Karol Wojtyla was later to become Pope, known as Pope John Paul 11.

Source

The Holocaust - Martin Gilbert page 549-550 -------------------- Pope John Paul II.