My Life with Karol

Stanislaw Dziwisz spent 40 years at the side of the man who did more for human dignity than anyone else in the 20th century.

A Life with Karol: My Forty-Year friendship with the Man who became Pope | Stanislaw Dziwisz | Doubleday | 2008 | 272 pages
ISBN: 0385523742

In a recent Telegraph newspaper poll Margaret Thatcher was named the greatest post-war prime minister of Great Britain. Despite the contempt with which she was (and is) held by left-wingers, the poll pays tribute to her many achievements; she would undoubtedly join a roll-call of the significant world leaders of the 20th century. Yet if one is looking at such a roll-call to select one single person who did most to uphold the dignity of man during the latter part of the last century (though he was to die in 2005), the answer of many people from around the world, Christian or not, would be the name of John Paul II.

This book, a “conversation” between the Italian journalist Gian Franco Svidercoschi and Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz, helps in its own way to explain why the late Pope occupies such a pre-eminent place in the story of these turbulent times. The format is occasionally a little stilted as Svidercoschi tries to frame his questions to draw out the Cardinal’s memories. It does not aspire to be in any way comprehensive and only touches lightly on the public events of the Pope’s life. (The best book so far in this respect is the biography by George Weigel, and this itself will be updated in time by others, such is the multi-faceted personality of the John Paul II, the length of his pontificate and his place in history.)

But the Cardinal’s viewpoint is unique: he first met the then Father Wojtyla in 1957 when he entered the seminary. Made auxiliary bishop of Krakow in 1958, Wojtyla kept in touch with the seminarians he had been supervising. Then in 1966, as a young priest aged 27, Dziwisz was asked by the bishop if he would become his secretary. Thus the 40-year friendship began.

Dziwisz, raised by a devout mother in humble circumstances, had lost his own father at the age of nine. The Pope lost his mother at the same age, followed by his older brother when he was 12, and finally his father when he was in his early 20s. Thus it is not inappropriate to recognise in this friendship a particular spiritual fatherhood on the one hand, and an unwavering filial affection on the other. Dziwisz’ loyalty and devotion were total. His reminiscences do not contradict the public knowledge shared by the millions whose life were affected and often changed by the Pope during his travels and teachings, but they do add a personal dimension and warmth to what is already known.

So we are reminded of Bishop Wojtyla’s recollected preparation before Mass, his habit of weekly confession, his practice of working on pastoral documents in the chapel of the Episcopal residency in Krakow. None of this changed in later life. We are also reminded of his love for young people and solicitude for married couples as well as his closeness to the people of his diocese. Dziwisz spells out the difficulties of living under Communism and the bishop’s constant battles to defend the Polish people’s right to freedom of religious expression. He was followed everywhere by secret police; once he escaped them by jumping from one car to another, mid-journey; but he also waved at and blessed these policemen, calling them, with some irony, his “guardian angels”.

From the very beginning of their association the young priest noticed that the bishop practised personal austerity, or “poverty” as he calls it; he had only one black cassock, much patched and mended, and any royalties he earned from his writings, or offerings that were given to him, were immediately sent to charity. He did not have anything and he did not ask for anything. He disliked pomp; after his inauguration as Pope he refused the gestatorial chair -– “he had good legs, a mountaineer’s legs” -– the tiara and a coronation. In the Vatican he lived as simply as he had always done, with a sparsely furnished bedroom screened off from a tiny study, in which were just a chair and desk.

It took time, as Pope, to adjust to having very little privacy, though he always made time for prayer, rising at 5.30 every day to pray before Mass and constantly praying between his official engagements during the day. He would eat frugally at meals, but would try every dish -– a hangover from the war when, as Dziwisz points out, food was scarce and you never refused bread or potatoes.

In the early years Dziwisz and a couple of other priest ski-ers at the Vatican occasionally gave the Pope a surprise treat, by driving him in an old car out of a side entrance to the ski slopes of Ovindoli, where he could indulge his love of the mountains and of skiing. “He kept thanking us” -– a touching gratitude for the thoughtfulness of others.

The Pope also took his pastoral duties as Bishop of Rome very seriously. His last act every evening was to look out of his bedroom window and bless the city lying below him. Despite his enormous work load and constant travelling, he visited all the parishes of his diocese. The papal office did not constrain his naturalness or spontaneity: his kindness to a group of former prostitutes, who wept as they approached him, taking off his papal ring and giving it to the inhabitants of a Brazilian slum, speaking outside his official script and in shaky Spanish to a student gathering.

Some events of the pontificate stand out, even within the Cardinal’s natural reserve, particularly the assassination attempt of 13 May 1981 when the Pope collapsed in his secretary’s arms –- “I re-live the whole thing, moment by moment” -– and when the doctors of the Gemelli Clinic donated their own blood in order to save his life. At the same time, in Poland, Cardinal Wyszynski, the Primate, lay dying of cancer and Dziwisz describes an affecting phone conversation between the very sick Pope and the dying Cardinal, who had shared so many years of keeping alive the Polish Church under Communist rule.

During the Jubilee year 2000, the Pope had wanted to visit Abraham’s home in Ur, now in Iraq; this was refused by Saddam Hussein and the Pope was sent “a brick from Abraham’s house” instead. “I always thought Abraham lived in a tent” was his dry comment. Symptoms of Parkinson’s disease began in 1991; from then on, as the secretary remarks, the Pope was never far from the Cross.

Finally we come to his sudden decline and death in April 2005, surrounded by Polish priest friends, all in tears, yet singing the “Te Deum”; “I don’t remember anything else after that. It’s as if darkness suddenly descended on me”, admits Dziwisz, adding poignantly, “I was always at his side... But now he’s gone on alone.” After the Pope died I sent his secretary a letter of condolence and received a kind note in reply, in which he indicated his sense of loss.

It is worth reading this book for all its personal touches. They are not designed to be sensational but to contribute to a portrait of an extraordinary man, whose fearless championing of the dignity of all men, regardless of their beliefs, defence of peace, compassion and holiness went far deeper and well beyond the best of our political leaders. No study of recent history can afford to ignore him.

Francis Phillips writes from Bucks, in the UK.