Saturday, December 19, 2009

Venerable John Paul II: The record breaking pope


John Paul II is without a doubt the pope who has broken the most records in the Churchs history.

First, his pontificate is on the longest on record. He was the head of the Catholic Church for 26 years: only Pius IX and Saint Peters pontificates lasted longer than John Paul II.

Then he is also the most travelled pope. He left the Vatican more than 1,500 times for official trips. He visited 129 countries and travelled more than 1 million kilometers. Thats like going around the globe 30 times. If you a sum up the time he was on trips, you could say he lived outside of Rome for more than 2 ½ years.

He also held huge summits in both big cities and small islands with less than 100 inhabitants. The powerful, needy, the healthy and the sick, the young and, old all paid close attention to Pope John Paul II.

2 comments:

Chris Osgood said...

Awesome! When he died, I was still in the Baptist Church. However, watching others talk about him and seeing his life story, well, that is when I started to think that I may be called to the priesthood. And no, I didn't convert because of that, I did not want to be a priest. But now look, I am Catholic and now in the seminary studying for the priesthood! All thanks to JP2!!!

Padre Steve said...

That is awesome Chris! Be assured of my prayers these days! God bless your seminary experience!