Catholics pray for Pope's recovery
In big cities and quiet villages, Catholics around the world stopped to pray for Pope John Paul today as word spread that he had again been rushed to hospital.
In Wadowice, the small town in southern Poland where the Pope was born, people offered special prayers at an afternoon mass at St Mary’s Church, where Karol Wojtyla was baptised and attended Mass for years before he became a priest.
“This is a very emotional moment for me,” said Wadowice Zdzislaw Szczur, 54, a former activist with Solidarity, the trade union movement that took inspiration from the Pope in the struggle against communism.
“His suffering really moves me,” he said as he walked down a Wadowice street. “It’s all God’s providence now.”
In Warsaw, a fresh bouquet of yellow tulips lay at the base of a statue of the Pope holding a crucifix-engraved pastoral staff. In overwhelmingly Catholic Poland, love for the pope mingles piety and patriotism.
In central London, people leaving midday Mass at St. Etheldreda’s Church had the Pope on their minds.
“I think he has a lot of work to do yet,” said businesswoman Patricia Cullen, 43. She is hoping to see the Pope if he visits Germany as planned later this year.
In Detroit in the United States, Polish-American Cardinal Adam Maida, a long-time friend of the Pope, called on people to keep John Paul in their prayers and issued a suggested prayer.
“Father of all life, we ask your special blessing and protection for our Holy Father on earth,” Maida, who filled in for the Pope at a 1999 service in Poland when John Paul fell ill, said in his prayer message.
“We pray that through his suffering we may deepen our own faith in the mystery and hope of sharing in Christ’s Resurrection. According to your will, restore him to the service of your church and keep us all in your peace.”
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