St. John Paul II – whose feast day was Oct. 22 – was the second-longest-serving pope in modern history at 27 years, and he was the first non-Italian pontiff since the Dutch Pope Adrian VI in 1523. The far-reaching influence of this pope, who died on Apr. 2, 2005, is still being felt today. Here are a few things you might not know about him.
Pope John Paul II’s influence on the political landscape was enormous. Just days before President Ronald Reagan called on Mikhail Gorbachev to “tear down” the Berlin Wall in 1987, Reagan met with the pope. According to historian and author Paul Kengor, Reagan went so far as to call Pope John Paul II his “best friend,” opining that no one knew his soul better than the Polish pontiff, who had also suffered an assassination attempt and carried the burden of world leadership. In the course of 38 official visits and 738 audiences and meetings held with heads of state, John Paul II influenced civic leaders around the world in an epic battle with a Communist regime in the Soviet Union that would ultimately be responsible for the deaths of more than 30 million people. “He thought of himself as the universal pastor of the Catholic Church, dealing with sovereign political actors who were as subject to the universal moral law as anybody else,” biographer George Weigel said.