02 May 2011

John Paul II

As I read about the beatification in Rome, I think:  this is a very powerful saint.  Not only did he do amazing things for God during his journey through this vale of tears, he is still working for us in heaven.

I want to dig out the enormous New American Bible my mom got for me the year I was received into the Church.  Its language is beautiful, it was beautifully printed, and it contained an excellent dictionary/ cyclopedia in the back.  For some reason the Church didn't carry through on that, and the U.S. wing of the church continues to munge the NAB into stilted, deconstructed incomprehensibility.

But John Paul II was one of the great proponents of the vision of the Vatican II council.  He was a great man, only because he lived for the Lord.  Benedict XVI is another one of those.  They stand for the truth, in the face of a world yowling for anything but.  There were moments of beauty in the Vatican II council spirit, the idea of renewal without loss.  There were those who leveraged it for their own purposes.  They, and their self-referent ideas, are dying out.  But Jesus Christ still lives.

Jesus Christ still lives.

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