Rev. Fr. Don Anton Saman Hettiarachchi, Internet Media Ministry, St. Anthony’s Bible Academy (SABA) shares interesting insights on Pope St. John XXIII
On the eleventh of October what comes to our mind is none but ‘Johnny Walker.’ He frequently sneaked out of his official residence late at night for a walk around the streets of Rome. This habit earned him the nickname ‘Johnny Walker.’ He was Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli by Baptism, Pope John XXIII by designation and ‘il Papa buono’ (the Good Pope) by affection. This write-up is an inadequate tribute to this great personality.
The Bishop of Rome with a loving golden heart, John XXIII, was the first Pope since 1870 to make pastoral visits in his Diocese of Rome, visiting children’s hospitals and prisons. His Holiness visited on the Christmas Eve children infected with polio at the Ospedale Pediatrico Bambino Gesù (Baby Jesus Paediatric Hospital) and then visited the Ospedale di Santo Spirito (Holy Spirit Hospital), Rome. The following day, he visited Regina Coeli prison in Rome, where he told the inmates: “You could not come to me, so I came to you.”
These acts created a sensation, and the Pope wrote in his diary: “… great astonishment in the Roman, Italian and international press. I was hemmed in on all sides: authorities, photographers, prisoners, wardens…” This sensation continued to his death. He was buried on June 6 in the Vatican grottos. Two wreaths were placed on the two sides of his tomb. They were the floral tributes of the prisoners of the Regina Coeli prison in Rome and the Mantova jail in Verona.
During his visits, John XXIII put aside the normal papal use of the formal “we” when referring to himself, such as when he visited a reformatory school for juvenile delinquents in Rome telling them “I wanted to come here for some time.” The media noticed this and reported, “He talked to the youths in their own language.” Like those before him, John XIII was bestowed with an expensive silver tiara by the people of Bergamo. But he requested that the number of jewels used be halved and that the money be given to the poor. That was ‘il Papa buono’!
These outer expressions of the Pope like his actions and speech mannerisms came from his inner being. He hailed from a peasantry, tenant farming family in Sotto il Monte in Bergamo, Lombardy and not from a Roman aristocratic one. He always kept this in mind, no matter the greater heights he climbed later in life. Here we quote Pope’s very last words, uttered on death bed on 3 June 1963 to the Papal Sacristan, Msgr. Petrus Canisius Van Lierde, who was about to anoint him, “I had the great grace to be born into a Christian family, modest and poor, but with the fear of the Lord. My time on earth is drawing to a close. But Christ lives on and continues his work in the Church.” These words speak for themselves!
Pope John XXIII surprised the world as he was elected at the age seventy six. He had arrived at the Vatican with a return train ticket to Venice where he was the Patriarch. After the long Pontificate of Pope Pius XII, the Cardinals chose a man who – it was presumed by the world because of his advanced age – would be a short-term or ‘stop-gap’ pope. Nevertheless John XXIII further excited those who expected him to be a caretaker pope by calling the historic Second Vatican Council and opening the first session on October 11 in 1962. On that same night, the people in Saint Peter’s Square chanted and yelled with the sole objective of getting John XXIII to appear at the window to address them. He indeed appeared and made a passionate speech to them (which would later be called ‘Discorso della Luna’ or ‘Speech of the Moon’): “Dear children, returning home, you will find children. Give your children a hug and say, ‘This is a hug from the Pope!’” That was ‘il Papa buono’!
The sharecropper’s son from Sotto il Monte continued to excite the world through the changes of the Vatican II. When he announced the decision to convene the Council on 25 January 1959 at the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside the Walls, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini, who later became Pope Paul VI, remarked to Msgr. Giulio Bevilacqua, “This holy old boy does not realize what a hornet’s nest he is stirring up.” Indeed, he stirred a hornet’s nest! From the Second Vatican Council came winds of change that reshaped the face of Catholicism: a comprehensively revised liturgy, a stronger emphasis on ecumenism and a new approach to the world. Today we reap from what the Good Pope sowed.
Pope John XXIII did not live to see the Vatican Council to completion. He died of stomach cancer on 3 June 1963, four and a half years after his election and two months after the completion of his final encyclical, Pacem in terris (Peace on earth). The Pope is remembered on the eleventh of October since it was the opening day of the first session of Vatican II. The Council was his idea and it was he who convened it. Hence ‘Johnny Walker’ is aptly remembered on that day.
Pope John XXIII was very popular and much loved among his people in all continents and walks of life. He was for sure one of the most liked Popes of all times. Upon his death in 1963, the world mourned his passing greatly. He always remained ‘il Papa buono’, who captured the hearts of all his believers and non-believers alike.
Good Humour of Pope John XXIII
Pope John XXIII lived with keen sense of humor. The world still remembers him not only for his simple, peasant background but also for his tongue-in-cheek, wisecracking nature. How wonderful to keep his sense of humor, even while holding a position of such authority, when he could easily have become cold or authoritarian! Who couldn’t love a pope who had a sense of humor? Who couldn’t feel affection for a man who was so comfortable with himself that he constantly made jokes about his height (which was short), his ears (which were big), and his weight (which was considerable)?
Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli maintained his cheerful disposition right through his life. Once he was the Apostolic Nuncio to France. He was presented one day with the chief Rabbi of Paris and the two had a warm conversation. When they were ready to move into the sitting room, the Rabbi courteously invited the Archbishop to go first. The Archbishop Roncalli responded, “Please, the Old Testament first …”
When he was the Patriarch of Venice, the Archbishop Roncalli was talking with a wealthy city resident. At the end of the conversation, the Patriarch told him, “You and I have one thing in common: money. You have a lot and I have nothing at all. The difference is I do not care about it.” Another day when a journalist asked him what he would be if he could live his life all over again, the Patriarch said, “Journalist.” Then he said with a smile, “Now let us see if you have the courage to tell me that, if you could do it all over again, you’d be the patriarch!”
Of the three cassocks prepared for whoever the new pope was, even the largest was not enough to fit his five-foot-two, 200-plus-pound frame, which had to be let out in certain places and only to be held together with great effort by bobby pins. When he first saw himself in the mirror in his new vestments, Pope John XXIII said with an apprising and critical look “This man will be a disaster on television!”, while later saying he felt his first appearance before the globe was as if he were a “newborn babe in swaddling clothes.”
Following his election Pope John XXIII was walking in the streets of Rome. A woman passed him and said to her friend: “My God, he is so fat!” Overhearing what she said, the new Pope turned around and casually remarked: “Madame, I trust you understand that the holy conclave is not exactly a beauty contest!”
With his great sense of humour, the Pope could reach the children and the youth of the day. Visiting a hospital, he asked a boy what he wanted to be when he grew up. The boy said either a policeman or a pope. “I would go in for the police if I were you,” the Pope said. “Anyone can become a pope, look at me!” The boy burst into laughter and forgot that he was in hospital.
When the Pope once met a little boy named Angelo, he exclaimed, “That was my name, too!” And then, conspiratorially said, “But then they made me change it!”
On another occasion, the Pope confessed, “It often happens that I wake up at night and begin to think about the serious problems afflicting the world and I tell myself, I must talk to the Pope about it in the morning. Then the next day when I wake up I remember that I am the Pope.”
The Pope John XXIII was close to the people, especially to the working class from where he emerged with its humble beginning as a sharecropper’s son in Sotto il Monte. He would stop and chat with everyone he encountered. One day as he was wandering the halls of the Vatican he came across an electrician who was working there. The man did not recognize him as the Pope. He thought he was just another priest working at the Vatican. Pope John asked the man how things were going and the man complained that the Vatican paid terribly low wages. The Pope said “We should do something about that.” The electrician replied, “Yes, if it were only possible, Father.” The Pope began smiling and answered, “Just between us, I am not a Priest. I am the Pope.” The next day all the Vatican workers received a 25% raise. When a cardinal complained that a rise in Vatican salaries meant a particular usher earned as much as the cardinal, the Pope remarked: “That usher has 10 children; I hope the cardinal does not.”
John XXIII’s sense of humour did not make the Pope a happy-go-lucky one. He was serious in his work and firm in his decisions. In reply to a reporter who asked, “How many people work in the Vatican?” the Pope reportedly said: “About half of them.” Another day, when the Holy Father went to visit a friend at the nearby Hospital of the Holy Spirit in the evening, the nun answering the door said: “Holy Father, I am the mother superior of the Holy Spirit.” He replied: “Lucky you! What a job! I am just the Vicar of Christ.” A Vatican official told the Pope it would be “absolutely impossible” to open the Second Vatican Council by 1963. “Fine, we will open it in 1962,” he answered. And he did!
With humor we lighten up each day, and we find common ground with others. We build healthy relationships with others by knowing what to say and to do that helps, and what hinders, a conversation. When humor is successful, we build trust and cooperation. We discover that we are not alone, we learn to accept our mistakes, and we look for the good in others and in our selves. Most important, we create common ground. However, when we lose our sense of humor, we often get critical or defensive, and we blame others or ourselves for what was said, and how it was said. On the contrary, too much humor, like too much spice, often annoys others. Humor that is perceived as insensitive often leads others to shut down, or become argumentative. But when we each maintain our sense of humor, we look for the good in others and in our selves.
