HISTORY OF THE DAY
According to Oleg Loginov
May 13
THE ASSASSINATION OF JOHN PAUL II
In 1978, the 264th Pope John Paul II became the first pope of non-Italian origin elected in the last 455 years
Karol Jozef Wojtyla was born on May 18, 1920 in the town of Wadowice near Krakow in the family of a lieutenant of the Polish army. During the German occupation, Karol supported himself and his father by working in a quarry, then moved to a chemical plant. He urged Polish workers not to transfer hatred of the occupiers to the innocent Volksdeutsche, Rusyns and Gurals from the workers themselves.
In March 1945, after the liberation of Krakow by Soviet troops, Wojtyla wrote in one of his letters that «communism is a demagogic utopia, and Poland and the Polish Communists have nothing in common except language.» Even in his youth, Karol became a polyglot and spoke quite fluently in thirteen languages — his native Polish, in addition to Slovak, Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, German, English, Italian, French, Spanish and Portuguese, and also knew Latin and Esperanto.
On October 20, 1946, Karol Wojtyla was ordained a deacon, and on November 1, 1946 — a priest, and a few days later went to Rome to continue his theological education.
In October 1978, a conclave was held in the Vatican to elect a new pope. The main contenders were Giuseppe Siri, Archbishop of Genoa and Giovanni Benelli, Archbishop of Florence. But since the votes for them were divided, eventually Wojtyla became a compromise candidate and was elected pope. Upon his accession to the throne, Wojtyla took the name of his predecessor and became John Paul II.
After his election, Pope John Paul II received Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko on January 24, 1979 at his request, which was an unprecedented event, since diplomatic relations between the USSR and the Vatican did not exist at that time. And the next day John Paul II went on a pastoral mission to Mexico — the first of 104 foreign trips of the pontiff.
ATTEMPT ON THE PONTIFF
An attempt on the pontiff, a hand holding a pistol is circled.
On May 13, 1981, the reign of 62-year-old John Paul II (Pope John Paul II) was almost cut short as a result of an assassination attempt on him in the Vatican’s St. Peter’s Square. Peter.
On this day, Paul II was to deliver his traditional address to the flock. He was traveling in an open car, which slowly made its way through the crowd of believers gathered in St. Peter’s Square. Suddenly shots rang out. The Holy father fell into the arms of his secretary. Trickles of blood appeared on the pope’s white silk clothes.
Two bullets hit him in the stomach, the other two – in the hand and in the right arm above the elbow. Two women were also injured. Only after that, the man who fired from the crowd gathered was thrown to the ground and disarmed. As it turned out, the attempt was made by a member of the Turkish far-right group «Gray Wolves» Mehmet Ali Agca. He got to Italy after escaping from a Turkish prison, where he was serving time for murder and bank robbery.
Bodyguards near John Paul II after he was shot at in St. Peter’s Square in the Vatican.
The pope was immediately taken to the hospital, where they operated for 4 hours. Only after that, the doctors reported that the supreme hierarch’s life was no longer in danger, despite the fact that he had lost almost three quarters of his blood.
Subsequently, John Paul II came to believe that the bullets were taken away from him by the hand of the Mother of God herself.
Mehmet Ali Aglja is escorted by policemen to the headquarters of the Rome Police on May 14, 1981.
Ali Agdja testified that Bulgarian special services were involved in the assassination attempt, after which charges were brought against three Bulgarian citizens and three Turkish citizens, including Bulgarian citizen Sergei Antonov, who was declared the coordinator of the assassination attempt. The version about the involvement of the KGB in this has spread. Defector Viktor Sheymov, a former agency agent, recalled that in a telegram signed by Yuri Andropov in the late 1970s, the secret service was ordered to collect information on how to «physically approach the pope,» which meant planning an assassination attempt. However, all the accused, except Agji, were acquitted for lack of evidence.
Pope John Paul II visits his would-be murderer Mehmet Ali Aglja in prison in 1983.
In 1983, the pope visited the imprisoned Ali Agja, who was sentenced to life imprisonment at that time. They talked about something when they were alone, but the topic of their conversation is still unknown. At the request of John Paul II, Agdja was pardoned by the Italian authorities and in 2000 handed over to Turkish justice, by which he was later found guilty of committing other crimes.
In 2005, Ali Agja said that some Vatican cardinals were involved in the assassination attempt. On January 18, 2010, Mehmet Ali Agja was finally released.
EPILOGUE
The Catholic Church under John Paul II maintained an irreconcilable position on abortion and contraception. John Paul II strongly opposed homosexual marriage and euthanasia, opposed the ordination of women as priests, and also supported celibacy.
At the same time, while preserving the fundamental canons of faith, he proved the ability of the Catholic Church to develop together with civilization, recognizing the achievements of civil society and scientific and technological progress.
Saint Isidore of Seville
He even appointed Saints Methodius and Cyril as patrons of the European Union, and Saint Isidore of Seville, who was known as the founder of medieval encyclopedism and a prolific church writer, as the patron of the Internet.
Photo rating on the topic «Murder of priests»
*Texts from Wikipedia and other Internet resources were used.
*Translated using an electronic dictionary. The original text in Russian and much more on the criminal topic can be selected on the main page of the site — http://crimerecords.info/
