Chapter One

THE FINAL DAYS OF JOHN PAUL II

When Karol Wojtyla was elected to the Throne of Peter on October 16, 1978, the world was dazzled by his sheer physical force. He was, to invoke a tired expression, a “man’s man”—rugged, handsome, brimming with energy and self-confidence. Fr. Andrew Greeley, the American novelist and sociologist, rightly observed that he looked like a linebacker in American football. Archbishop Michael Miller, today a senior Vatican official, who at the time of Wojtyla’s election was a junior cleric in the Secretariat of State, said in a January 2005 reminiscence that from the moment John Paul II stepped out onto the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica, “He simply dominated that space. He looked like he had been pope forever.”

In the press coverage from those early years, the Pope was dubbed “God’s athlete.” He skied, climbed mountains, swam, and had an undying passion for the outdoors. The story of his nomination to be a bishop in Poland, when he had to interrupt a camping trip in order to accept and then went immediately back to kayaking after he had signed the paperwork, became the stuff of legend. At the table, the Pope had the hearty appetite of a man who once worked in the Solvay salt quarry outside Krakow; he could wolf down a plate of Polish sausage and potatoes, and a glass of beer, with obvious gusto. Even when he was wearing his pontifical vestments and saying Mass, he projected a raw physical energy. When he traveled, he kept up a brutal schedule that left his aides, as well as the journalists who traveled with him, exhausted. It seemed that he chafed against the very limits of time and space, so brimming was he with determination and drive. In 1979, for example, he took a nine-day trip to the United States and Ireland, and over the course of that time he delivered a staggering seventy-six speeches, which works out to roughly eight and a half speeches per day. Oral tradition in the press corps that followed the Pope has it that at one point, exhausted reporters tossed a message up to the front section of the papal plane asking for a day off, which produced a smile from John Paul II, as if to say, “I dare you to keep up.”

This was a pope who understood the virtue of keeping in shape. Upon his election, he ordered a swimming pool installed at Castel Gandolfo, the pope’s summer residence outside Rome. When some in the Roman Curia, the papal bureaucracy, objected to the expense, he replied, “It’s cheaper than holding another conclave.” Coming fast on the death of his predecessor, Pope John Paul I, after just thirty-three days, his point was well taken.

John Paul II’s astounding drive did not, of course, come just from his physical strength. He also had a deep, unwavering confidence in divine providence, that God would not send him any burden that was not accompanied by the strength to bear it, and that everything that happened to him was according to cosmic design. It was his firm belief, for example, that on May 13, 1981, the Virgin Mary altered the flight path of would-be assassin Mohammed Ali Agca’s bullet in order to save his life and prolong his papacy. May 13 is the Feast Day of Our Lady of Fatima, and on the first anniversary of the assassination attempt, John Paul II traveled to Fatima in Portugal in order to lay the bullet that doctors had removed from his body before the statue of the Virgin, thanking her for coming to his aide. The motto of his pontificate was Totus tuus, “totally yours,” meaning that he had offered it to the Virgin Mary, and now he believed she had returned the favor.

It was in part that belief in providence that allowed John Paul II to bear the sufferings and ailments of his final years, not just with grim determination, but with serenity and good humor. Always the “great communicator,” John Paul learned to use his growing physical limits—the Parkinson’s disease, hip ailments, breathing problems, and arthritis—as another set of tools in his evangelizing toolbox, capitalizing on his infirmity as a “teaching moment” about the value and dignity of human life from the beginning to the end.

In one sense, John Paul’s long winter, roughly dating from the mid-1990s to his death on April 2, 2005, illustrates the inhuman nature of the job he held. To be a pope is, in effect, a life sentence, and by the great Jubilee Year of 2000, the toll it had taken on John Paul II was unmistakable. His once-beaming, lively face had become frozen into a sort of Parkinsonian mask. His stooped frame and trembling hands spoke more eloquently than words ever could about the bone-crushing nature of the papacy. Yet the Pope’s deep faith meant that it never even crossed his mind to abandon his post. Later, some would read his final will and testament, released days after his death, to indicate doubt on this question; John Paul wrote in 2000, “I hope [the Lord] will help me to recognize up to what point I must continue this service to which I was called on October 16, 1978.” It seems clear, however, that John Paul was referring in this passage to the prospect of death, not resignation. He added in the very next line, “I ask him to call me back when He Himself wishes.” As John Paul said on numerous occasions, “Christ did not come down off the Cross.” John Paul was convinced that God had given him a mission, and God would decide when it was complete.

On what turned out to be one of his final apostolic voyages, to Christianity’s premier healing shrine in Lourdes, France, in the summer of 2004, John Paul II declared himself a “sick man among the sick.” By that stage, his transformation from corporate CEO to an icon of human suffering was complete. As I walked through the crowd of 200,000 people gathered for John Paul’s Sunday morning Mass on August 15, I saw tens of thousands of people using canes and walkers and in wheelchairs. When the ailing, elderly John Paul II appeared, many in the crowd recognized one of their own, and the emotional response was electric.

“My mother had Parkinson’s disease for thirty years, and I was with her,” said Irish pilgrim Lyla Shakespeare. “When I looked at the Pope today, all I could see was my mother.” But, she added, “I also saw Christ.”

Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger of France put the theological reading of John Paul’s physical decline this way: “The Pope, in his weakness, is living more than ever the role assigned to him of being the Vicar of Christ on earth, participating in the suffering of our Redeemer. Many times we have the idea that the head of the Church is like a super-manager of a great international company, a man of action who makes decisions and is judged on the basis of his effectiveness. But for believers the most effective action, the mystery of salvation, happens when Christ is on the cross and can’t do or decide anything other than to accept the will of the Father.”

Granted, not everyone saw it this way. Over the last years of John Paul’s life, there were persistent calls on him to resign on the grounds that he was harming the Church by depriving it of the opportunity for more energetic leadership. Some saw his determination to continue not as heroic but as stubborn, even egotistical, as if Roman Catholicism could not go on without him. Others felt the images of the suffering Pope weren’t so much inspiring as embarrassing, even pathetic. All this is a matter of legitimate discussion, and when the immediate outpouring of sorrow and respect that follows the death of any great figure subsides, no doubt that conversation will continue.

However one resolves those questions, it seems indisputable that in death, as in life, John Paul made us think. For all the ink that was spilled over nearly twenty-seven years about John Paul the politician or John Paul the globetrotter, in the long run it may be this final period of his papacy, John Paul the invalid, that leaves the deepest impression. He made us watch him slump and wince and become confused, and thereby forced us to confront the reality of decline and death—our own and that of our loved ones. One simply could not watch the Pope in his last days and not think about the final things, about the meaning and purpose of human life.

That, by itself, is a legacy.

THE FINAL DAYS

Looked at in reverse, it seems self-evident that from the hospitalization of February 1 forward we were on a papal “death watch,” that the end of John Paul’s long reign was in sight. Yet until the very end, the very night the Pope died, many Vatican officials, journalists, and ordinary Romans remained skeptical that it would actually happen. We had survived so many health scares before that it seemed part of the script that John Paul would defy predictions of his demise once more and pull through. Just days before his death, senior aides were telling reporters that the Pope still intended to travel to Cologne, Germany, in August for World Youth Day, and they were serious. One reason that St. Peter’s Square did not swell with well-wishers until the very end was that Romans had seen it all before, and at some level had grown accustomed to thinking of John Paul II as virtually immortal.

Obviously, however, the end had to come for Karol Wojtyla as it does for all human beings, and that was the drama of February and March 2005 in Rome.

Tuesday, February 1

At approximately 10:50 p.m. Rome time, John Paul II was rushed from the papal apartments to the nearby Gemelli Polyclinic Hospital, where the tenth floor is permanently set aside for his use. Several hours later the Vatican reported that he had been suffering from respiratory problems complicated by spasms of the larynx, and that he had been placed under the care of the department of emergency medicine as a “precautionary move.” Long into the night, speculation swirled in the city and throughout the world, that the Pope might be in mortal danger. While the Vatican minimized the seriousness of the episode, press reports would later claim that John Paul had actually been minutes away from death due to severe respiratory difficulties.

(One comic aside: Word of the hospitalization broke around 11:00 p.m. in Rome, at which time a substantial chunk of the city’s journalistic community was at the Foreign Press Club at a gala dinner. I’m told that the buzzing of cell phones set on “vibrate” going off simultaneously produced an audible hum in the room, though I wasn’t there to witness it. Instead, my cell phone jarred me from the early stages of a good night’s sleep, which was obviously not to be.)

John Paul was no stranger to the Gemelli. He once jokingly referred to the hospital as the “third Vatican,” after the Vatican itself and his summer residence at Castel Gandolfo, in the Alban hills outside Rome. This episode marked the ninth time the Pope had been hospitalized at the Gemelli over the course of his papacy, including the 1981 assassination attempt, though it was the first time it had happened in response to a crisis in the middle of the night. The Pope’s inner circle had apparently hoped to hospitalize him without fanfare, and then make an announcement in the morning. How they expected to keep the news of an impromptu papal hospitalization under wraps for twelve hours is unclear, but in any event word leaked moments after the papal entourage pulled through the hospital gates, and from that point forward, it was off to the races for the world press.

The Pope’s health crisis was not a complete bolt from the blue, since on the previous Sunday, January 30, during his regular Angelus address, his voice had seemed strikingly hoarse and weak. Yet his body language that day did not seem alarming; John Paul was flanked by a couple of small Italian children who helped him release two “peace doves,” one of which flew back into the room, with John Paul laughing and playfully trying to bat it away. It was to be the last time the world saw John Paul II with the broad smile that was such a trademark of his public image.

Later that Sunday night, Vatican spokesperson Joaquin Navarro-Valls announced that due to a case of the flu, the Pope’s appointments would be canceled for the next day. On Monday evening, word broke that the Pope’s schedule for Tuesday and Wednesday had been scrubbed as well. Official confirmation of the cancellations came Tuesday morning. By midday Tuesday, however, the sense was that he was improving and would probably return to work on Thursday. That same day, I spoke by telephone with Navarro-Valls, who is also a medical doctor, who joked that “a flu given proper treatment lasts seven days, whereas the flu without care runs seven days.” In other words, he expected the Pope was on his way to a normal recovery.

Obviously something dramatic transpired after dinner Tuesday night. Navarro-Valls later described it as “acute laryngeal tracheitis,” meaning the Pope had throat problems that led to difficult breathing. Given his age and Parkinson’s disease, the Pope has long struggled for breath, and thus his personal physician, Renato Buzzonetti, who was summoned to monitor the Pope’s condition, decided not to gamble with the possibility of respiratory arrest. The Pope was placed in an ambulance and driven speedily through a Vatican side entrance to the Gemelli, about two and a half miles from St. Peter’s Square.

Vatican spokespersons the next day attempted to calm fears by insisting that there was “nothing alarming.” Wednesday morning, February 2, Navarro-Valls went to the Gemelli to see the Pope, and then told journalists that John Paul was in good spirits. The Pope’s vital signs were normal, Navarro-Valls said, he slept during the night, and was under the care of the hospital’s department of emergency medicine. In remarks to journalists, Navarro-Valls added that the Pope had a “slight fever,” but had never lost consciousness, had not undergone a CAT scan (as had been initially reported in some Italian newspapers), and was preparing to say Mass with his private secretary, Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz. Later in the morning, Navarro-Valls told Vatican Radio that the Pope was expected to remain at Gemelli just for “a few days.”

Reassuring bulletins were issued Thursday and Friday as well. In a briefing in the Vatican Press Office on Friday, Navarro-Valls told reporters that the Pope’s condition had improved, and that there would be no further bulletins until Monday. Pushed by Alessio Vinci of CNN as to why the Vatican would, in effect, go silent about the Pope’s condition for forty-eight hours, Navarro-Valls responded, “I can think of American situations where there’s been less information than we’ve given. I can’t feed your television station twenty-four hours a day.” Navarro-Valls also said that the Pope would follow a ceremony scheduled for Saturday with Roman seminarians from a television monitor in his room, and that he wanted to lead his regular Sunday Angelus address, but the exact way in which it might happen was still to be determined. Navarro-Valls added that the Vatican had received a flood of phone calls and faxes wishing the Pope a speedy recovery, including a call from the Chief Rabbi of Rome, who wanted to tell the Pope that “we are praying for him.”

Some Vatican officials attempted to project a testy “there they go again” air with respect to media sensationalism about the Pope’s health. When Navarro-Valls was asked whether the Pope had ever lost consciousness, for example, his literal response in Italian was per carità!, which translates roughly as “for God’s sake.” No doubt there was over-interpretation involved. Yet journalists could be forgiven for jumping the gun, since it is not every day that the Pope is taken to the emergency room. Moreover, in the absence of swift and reliable information, speculation and worst-case scenarios are bound to take over. As things turned out, it was less a case of reporters making too much of a minor illness than the Vatican making too little of serious conditions that eventually snowballed and led to John Paul’s final agony.

Sunday, February 6

As expected, John Paul appeared at the window of the tenth floor of the Gemelli Hospital on Sunday, February 6, for the Angelus. The text of his message was read by the sostituto, or “substitute,” in the Secretariat of State, Archbishop Leonardo Sandri. John Paul spoke briefly, reciting two final invocations in the Angelus as well as the sign of the cross.

Though his voice was weak and raspy, the body language seemed relatively good. The Pope first appeared slumped over, but at a couple of points he straightened up and seemed in control of himself. Perhaps the most reassuring element of the event was that his doctors permitted him to sit for roughly ten minutes in front of an open window on a chilly Roman morning. Especially since spending time in front of a window in his study on January 30, an even colder day, was among the factors many people believe brought on his flu in the first place, this choice suggested that his doctors were not worried that another gust of cold air might send the Pope back into crisis.

Yet there were at least two elements of the Angelus appearance that triggered new controversy. First, a debate broke out over whether what the audience heard that morning was actually live or a recording. After the fact, some believed that the Vatican had the Pope lip-synch to a recording he had made earlier, out of fear that he would not be able to perform when the moment came. That theory was bolstered by the fact that observers standing in St. Peter’s Square who planned to watch the Angelus on a big TV screen clearly heard a few words from the Pope over loudspeakers just before the broadcast began, which sounded to some like a tape being cued.

Listening carefully to the playback, there appears to be a clear shift from an exceptionally weak and soft voice on the initial invocation, to a stronger, louder, and deeper voice for the sign of the cross. Between the two there is a distinct “click” that some interpreted as the sound of switching on a tape recording. If the Vatican had used a tape recording, it would not be a complete surprise. In the past, when the Pope has been hospitalized, tape recordings have been made of his greetings in case he was not capable of delivering them live, and then his condition was analyzed shortly beforehand to determine if the tape was necessary. Some even believed that such a tape was triggered by accident halfway through the Pope’s comments.

Yet by week’s end, many seemed convinced that the comments were indeed live, and that the clicking and shift in voice quality were related to moving the microphone in his room.

At 5:30 p.m. Sunday afternoon, Navarro-Valls sent the following declaration to journalists via e-mail: “Naturally, the words of the Holy Father in the benediction this morning were pronounced by him in the same moment in which we heard them in a live broadcast. Thus the affirmation of a previous recording of those words transmitted in that moment doesn’t make sense.”

In any event, whether the Pope was live or Memorex almost didn’t matter if the point was to get a reading on his physical state. People who were in the room Sunday morning all said, to the National Catholic Reporter and to other press outlets, that the Pope pronounced the words he was supposed to speak, and did so without obvious struggles. Whether they were broadcast live, or whether a tape kicked in at some point, was therefore perhaps irrelevant in terms of establishing his condition.

The second controversy stemming from the February 6 Angelus concerned why a papal aide held a piece of paper in front of John Paul’s face, presumably with the lines of the Angelus and the sign of the cross. Some hypothesized that it was to disguise the use of a recording. Others, however, wondered why the Pope needed to be reminded of the words of a prayer he presumably knew by heart, fueling speculation about his mental state. Was he so out of it, some wondered, that he had to be coached on how to lead the sign of the cross?

The official answer, given to me by Vatican officials who deal with papal protocol, was that the Pope always has a sheet with the Angelus prayers in front of him, but usually we don’t see it because it rests on a small lectern in front of the window in his studio. It’s not because he can’t remember the prayers, they say, but it’s the same reason that priests always have a book with the prayers of the Mass in front of them: because exact recitation is important, and anybody can experience a “mental block.” Indeed, one senior Vatican official later pointed out to me that if one looked closely at Sandri as he was leading the prayers on the Pope’s behalf, an official was holding a paper with the words up for him, too.

Thursday, February 10

The Pope returned to the Vatican on Thursday, February 10, after spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls announced that his inflammation of the larynx was healed, that his general condition was continuing to improve, and that all diagnostic tests were clear. The mode of his return was classic John Paul, a brilliant piece of theater that captured the world’s attention. He climbed into the Pope-mobile at the entrance to the Gemelli Hospital at around 7:30 p.m. and drove back to the Vatican, down the Via Gregorio VII, a broad street leading to the eastern entrance to the Vatican. Television covered the entire procession live, and all along the path well-wishers turned out to wave and cheer on the Pope. The Pope seemed alert and engaged, obviously enjoying the scene. It was widely interpreted by commentators as a triumphant, emphatic way of saying “I’m back in business.”

Despite the impressive display, the length of the Pope’s stay at Rome’s Gemelli Polyclinic Hospital, nine nights all told, suggested that his condition was far more serious than the reassuring tones from the Vatican implied. Sensing that there was concern in the air, Vatican sources supplied a logistical motive for the long convalescence: the annual Lenten Retreat in the Roman Curia began Sunday, February 13. By bringing the Pope back to the Apostolic Palace near the end of the week, the Vatican did not have to explain why he would not be seen for several more days. During the weeklong annual retreat, normal Vatican business is suspended and the Pope does not appear in public, so there was no need—at least for that week—to explain why John Paul was off the public stage. The retreat bought some time to monitor his condition and determine what level of activity he might be able to sustain.

(As a footnote, the Pope’s return to the Vatican on the eve of February 11 was propitious, since it is both the anniversary of the Lateran Pacts of 1929, and therefore more or less Vatican Independence Day, as well as the Church’s annual Day of the Sick.)

As the Pope appeared to have weathered the immediate crisis, public conversation shifted from whether he would survive to whether he should continue in office. There was a minitempest earlier in the week when the Vatican’s secretary of state, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, answered a couple of questions from reporters on the sidelines of a book presentation. He expressed the hope that John Paul II would pass the record of papal longevity set by Pope Pius IX, who reigned thirty-two years and seven months, a milestone John Paul would not pass until 2010. Yet when asked about a possible resignation, Sodano did not seem to rule it out completely: “If there is a man who loves the Church more than anybody else, who is guided by the Holy Spirit, if there is a man who has marvelous wisdom, that’s him. We must have great faith in the Pope. He knows what to do.” In substance, what Sodano seemed to be saying was that, “it’s up to the Pope.” Nevertheless, the fact that Sodano was not more emphatic, along the lines of “never in a million years,” became in some media retelling a subtle way of preparing the ground for papal abdication. The truth is, there was never any serious indication that John Paul might resign. In his Angelus message on Sunday he struck precisely this note: Even in the hospital, the Pope wrote in his message read by Sandri, “I continue to serve the Church and all of humanity.”

Thursday, February 24

After a two-week lull on the papal health beat, news broke in the early afternoon Rome time that John Paul II had been taken back to the Gemelli Hospital, marking his second hospitalization in less than a month. It was obvious now, if it had not been before, that the Pope’s condition was indeed serious, though it was not yet clear if the various conditions described in Vatican bulletins added up to anything fatal.

Late Thursday evening, the Pope underwent a tracheotomy. At 9:15 p.m. on the evening of February 24, Navarro-Valls released a statement to news agencies after John Paul II had exited the operating room and was still under the effects of anesthesia. It read, “The flu syndrome, which was the reason behind the Pope’s admittance this morning to Gemelli Polyclinic, in recent days was complicated by new episodes of acute respiratory insufficiency, caused by a pre-existing functional restriction of the larynx. This clinical picture pointed to an elective tracheotomy to assure adequate breathing for the patient and to favor the resolution of the larynx pathology. The Holy Father, duly informed, gave his consent. The procedure, which began at 8:20 p.m. and ended at 8:50 p.m., was successfully completed. The immediate post-operative situation is regular.”

The next day, at a 12:15 Vatican briefing, Navarro-Valls confirmed that John Paul II had undergone a tracheotomy the previous evening to relieve respiratory difficulties (a procedure described as “elective” rather than “emergency”). The Pope, he said, was now breathing more comfortably, and recovering some of his vocal capacity. Navarro-Valls indicated that the operation was finished “in a positive way” and lasted thirty minutes. Navarro-Valls also told the media that the morning after his operation, John Paul II ate a small breakfast of coffee, yogurt, and ten small cookies. Some felt the account strained credibility, since it seemed unlikely that a patient with a tracheal tube could actually swallow cookies, but the effort was to project an air of normality. When popes are ill, this sort of gentle exaggeration, if that’s what it was, has usually been considered defensible as a means of calming concerns.

What made this hospitalization especially surprising was that John Paul had twice greeted pilgrims at the window of his studio at St. Peter’s Square since his release from Gemelli on February 10, and, on both occasions, seemed clearly to be on the mend. On the previous Wednesday, February 23, John Paul had made his longest public appearance since falling ill. With each successive appearance, he seemed a little stronger, a little more alert, and his voice rang out with greater clarity. Both the press corps and most Vatican officials concluded that he was recovering, and began relaxing back into business as usual. The impromptu rush to the Gemelli jolted them out of that complacency.

Later, physicians quietly said that John Paul’s iron determination to get back to the Vatican after his hospitalization earlier in the month may have actually contributed to the second crisis. Dr. Corrado Manni, the Pope’s former anesthesiologist, told the Italian newspaper La Stampa that John Paul should have “definitely” stayed hospitalized longer, but he added that the Pope had also been a “difficult” patient after the 1981 attempt on his life.

“He told me: ‘The Pope is either well, and then he must leave, or he is not well, and then he must stay,’ ” Manni recalled. “I answered him: ‘Your Holiness, there is a state of illness and of well-being, but in the middle there is a third state, that of convalescence.’ Words spoken to the wind. I understand the difficulties his aides must have in dealing with such a situation. The Holy Father is difficult.”

Early March 2005

On Tuesday, March 1, the Pope had a working meeting at Gemelli with Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, after which Ratzinger said the Pope was engaged in the conversation and had spoken briefly in both Italian and German. It marked the first public indication that the Pope had recovered his capacity to speak, and optimism seemed to be in the air. A senior Vatican official told the National Catholic Reporter on March 2 that the Pope’s progress was steady, and that there was every expectation that he would be able to resume his normal activity in relatively short order. Plans were being made for new documents and even new trips, on the assumption that John Paul would emerge from the hospital with a reduced vocal capacity but little else by way of wear and tear. Reports in the Italian press that John Paul II had been on a respirator following his emergency hospitalization were denied by spokesperson Navarro-Valls.

Even those disinclined to believe the Vatican’s reassuring tones were more likely to speculate about scenarios involving permanent incapacitation rather than swift death. An endless series of television packages and newspaper articles aired in these days pointed out, for example, that there is no provision in the Code of Canon Law for declaring the papacy vacant if a pope were to remain alive but in a persistent vegetative state. Many speculated about what might happen in such a scenario, but everyone seemed in agreement that no clear answer existed. To some extent, these fears were perhaps exaggerated; in an interview just days before the Pope’s death, Cardinal Francis Stafford from the United States, head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, a Vatican court that deals with matters of conscience, pointed out to the National Catholic Reporter that the prospect of death creates anxieties about worst-case scenarios that rarely come to pass. Still, several cardinals privately said during this period that one immediate task facing the next pope would be to convene a blue-ribbon panel of canon lawyers and other experts to come up with a solution to this scenario, given the capacity of medical science to sustain people, including popes, in life long beyond their ability to think or communicate.

On Thursday, March 3, Navarro-Valls told reporters that the Pope’s health was in “progressive, continual improvement,” that he was nourished regularly, that he was spending several hours every day in a chair, and that he also was spending time in the small chapel next to his hospital room. The Pope was receiving aides from the Vatican, Navarro-Valls said, and “follows the activity of the Holy See and the life of the Church daily.” He was also continuing exercises to improve his breathing and speech, Navarro-Valls said. Navarro-Valls refused to be drawn into speculating about when the Pope might leave the Gemelli, saying only that “I will tell you when the doctors tell me.” When asked if the Pope would come home before Easter, he said only, “It’s possible.”

Among both journalists and medical observers, it seemed odd that all the medical information concerning the Pope’s condition was coming from the Vatican’s spokesperson, and not from any of the physicians actually involved in his treatment. In the past, medical bulletins about the Pope’s health had been signed by his doctors, whereas in this case it was all coming directly from Navarro-Valls. Sources at the Gemelli remained largely mum, explaining to reporters that word had gone out that leaking information to the media would cost them their jobs. This situation led some to wonder if a “filter” was being applied to the medical information, so that only what the Vatican wanted on the public record got out. During this period, I asked Navarro-Valls if reporters could have access to some of the physicians treating the Pope. He responded that this was up to the doctors, but they probably did not want to give interviews. Instead, Navarro-Valls gave me the following statement: “From the very beginning—that is, from the first recovery of the Holy Father in the Gemelli Hospital until now—all the clinical information that I have been releasing to the press was written by the group of physicians attending the Holy Father and was supervised by the personal physician of the Holy Father, Dr. Renato Buzzonetti.”

Navarro-Valls also told reporters that the Pope was maintaining his sense of humor. John Paul had written a note on the night of his tracheotomy, Navarro-Valls said, asking in jest, “What did they do to me?” Navarro-Valls wasn’t the only witness to the Pope’s good humor. According to Italian politician Gianni Letta, who visited the Pope prior to the tracheotomy, doctors described to the Pope what they intended to do, saying the intervention would involve “a small hole” in his throat. “Small, it depends for whom,” Letta recalled John Paul quipping.

John Paul also struck a more serious note, however, in reflecting on his illness. “I am always totus tuus,” Navarro-Valls quoted the Pope as writing during this time. “Totus tuus” is John Paul’s Latin motto meaning “I am completely in your hands.” The reference was to the Virgin Mary, whom John Paul always regarded as the patroness and protector of his pontificate. Even at what turned out to be just a month before the end finally came, John Paul’s thoughts still turned to the Madonna, whose maternal love had been such a strong feature of his spirituality and worldview.

Sunday, March 13

John Paul returned home from the Gemelli Polyclinic Hospital for the second time in less than a month on Sunday, March 13, just hours after appearing at his window from the hospital’s tenth floor and saying a few reassuring words in a raspy but comprehensible voice. “Dear brothers and sisters, thank you for your visit. To everyone, have a good Sunday and a good week,” he said, reading from a sheet of paper. He singled out faithful from his hometown of Wadowice, Poland, who had gathered below his hospital window, for a special greeting. Though John Paul struggled to catch his breath, the overall impression once again was of a man recovering from an illness. It was his first public appearance since the February 24 tracheotomy.

John Paul’s return was motivated in part by the fact that Holy Week began with Palm Sunday on March 20, and the Pope wanted to pass the holiest period of the Christian liturgical calendar in the Vatican. When John Paul was ready to go home, he exited the hospital, made the sign of the cross, and this time took a gray Mercedes minivan back to the Vatican. Cries of Viva il Papa! once again were heard along the route. In another bit of modern communications savvy, a Vatican television camera was actually positioned in the back of the mini-van, so all along the route viewers saw the scene from John Paul II’s point of view. The Pope’s motorcade crossed the spectacularly floodlit square just as night fell, passed beneath the Arch of the Bells, and disappeared inside the Vatican.

Late March 2005

Though not much news surfaced on the papal health front in the first three weeks of March, that doesn’t mean these were quiet times in Rome. In fact, virtually every day brought fresh rumors—that the Pope was dead, that he had slipped into a coma, that Vatican officials were quietly preparing to declare the See of Peter vacant, even that John Paul was actually much better than reported and preparing to startle the world once more. Reporters were constrained to leave their cell phones on at all hours, which meant, among other things, that virtually no one got a decent night’s sleep from February 1 through April 24, the date of the inaugural Mass of the new pope.

To take just one example, on Monday, March 21, at roughly 8:00 p.m. Rome time, rumors began to fly across town that John Paul II was dead. In this case, it seems the rumor first cropped up with an Italian TV channel. However such talk originated, once a journalist got hold of it, he or she began calling sources to try to find out what was going on. This being the Vatican, when those sources were unavailable or unresponsive, the journalist turned to colleagues to find out what they were hearing. Those journalists, in turn, started calling their own sources and colleagues, and so on. Pretty soon everyone in Rome was calling everyone else, recycling the same noninformation, hoping against hope to find that one person who actually knew something. It didn’t take long for something like mass panic to set in.

The only “official” channel of information in such a situation was Vatican spokesperson Navarro-Valls, who at least initially was not taking calls Monday night. Beyond him, the only sources who could authoritatively confirm or deny the story, at least in the critical early moments, were the Pope’s doctor, Buzzonetti, or his private secretary, Dziwisz, and neither were quickly reachable. For a half hour or so, there was no natural brake on people’s imaginations, and virtually anything seemed believable.

The backdrop to this speculation was the clearly visible fact that the Pope’s recovery was neither as speedy nor as full as his doctors had hoped. In his fleeting public appearances since coming home on March 13, he appeared gaunt, weak, and in discomfort, providing a context in which health speculation was certain to flourish. In the end, while such talk was premature, it was not far off the mark: John Paul II died just thirteen days after this particular rumor made the rounds.

Sunday, March 27

John Paul II delivered an Easter Sunday blessing to tens of thousands of people in St. Peter’s Square, but the ailing pontiff was unable to speak and managed only to greet the saddened crowd with a sign of the cross, bringing tears to the eyes of many. Aides had readied a microphone, and the Pope tried repeatedly to utter a few words from his studio window overlooking the square. But after making a few sounds, he resigned himself to blessing the crowd with his hand and the microphone was taken away. At one point he lifted his hand to his throat, as if to indicate to the crowd that he wanted to speak but just couldn’t manage because of his health difficulties. All told, John Paul spent twelve minutes and seventeen seconds at the window, and then was wheeled back inside. At two points, aides had tried to bring the Pope back in, but he pushed them away, insisting on staying at the window as long as possible.

There was a remarkable, if little noticed, dramatic arc to the scene. When Karol Wojtyla was elected pope on October 16, 1978, he stepped out onto the central balcony of St. Peter’s Square to deliver the traditional urbi et orbi blessing, “to the city and to the world,” and then ad-libbed a few lines to the assembled crowd. The papal Master of Ceremonies, now Cardinal Virgilio Noe, gently tried to steer him back after the blessing, as if to say that papal protocol did not allow anything else, but John Paul pushed him away. Once again, on this Easter day, John Paul would not allow his aides to come between him and the people. Thus at the very beginning and at the very end, John Paul II was determined to be pope his own way, deepening that special rapport with the public that went over the heads of church bureaucrats, politicians, and the press, reaching straight into the hearts of those masses who knew that he loved them, and who loved him ferociously in return.

This marked the first Easter Sunday Mass that John Paul was unable to celebrate in his twenty-six-year pontificate, so Cardinal Angelo Sodano, the Secretary of State and the Vatican’s number two official, led the Easter liturgy in St. Peter’s Basilica. In fact, the Pope missed all the Holy Week liturgical celebrations, a sure sign that his condition was serious indeed. Yet senior aides told reporters that in private the Pope seemed stronger than in public. They insisted he was able to speak and remained fully lucid. Such comments led many to believe that John Paul might yet stage a recovery and be able to continue for months, if not longer.

Wednesday, March 30

On this date, the pattern of Vatican communications on John Paul’s health took a sharp turn. Between March 10, two days prior to the Pope’s second return from the Gemelli Hospital, and March 30, there had not been a single bulletin on the Pope’s condition, despite the fact that his public appearances had been severely limited, and that he obviously seemed to be in a weakened and distressed state. That silence brought grumbling from journalists that the Vatican was hiding something, along with concern from the broader public. Beginning on March 30, however, the bulletins became much more regular and forthcoming, and the honesty of the information stood in stark contrast to the old Roman witticism that “the Pope is never sick until he’s dead.” Many longtime Vatican-watchers believed these days were among Joaquin Navaro-Valls’s finest hours, in that they exhibited the transparency and openness to the media that had always been John Paul’s trademark, however much it contrasted with normal operating procedure in the Vatican.

On March 30, Navarro-Valls told the press that John Paul was now receiving nutrition through a tube in his nose, since he was unable to swallow and digest nutrients on his own. Navarro-Valls later told the National Catholic Reporter that the tube had first been inserted on Tuesday morning, March 29, and that it was used only intermittently—that is, when the Pope needed to be fed. Navarro-Valls stressed that the tube was used only to “boost the Pope’s caloric intake,” and was not a matter of a life-or-death intervention. Earlier in the morning of March 30, John Paul had appeared at his Vatican window in place of the normal Wednesday audience, and was not wearing the tube at that point. The March 30 statement also said that John Paul was spending “many hours” seated in an armchair, that he celebrated Mass in his private chapel, and had work contacts with his aides “following directly the activities of the Holy See and the life of the Church.” It said the Pope continues “his slow and progressive convalescence,” and that public audiences remain suspended.

Navarro-Valls’s announcement created alarm in the American media, in part because the phrase “feeding tube” caused most Americans to think of Terry Schiavo, the Florida woman in a comalike state who was being kept alive only through the use of a surgically inserted feeding tube in her abdomen. In fact, there were three critical differences between the Pope’s tube and Schiavo’s. First, the tube used with John Paul II was not implanted surgically, and he did not have to wear it constantly. It was run down the nose and into the intestine when needed, then removed. Second, John Paul II remained conscious, and made decisions for himself about the course of his treatment. Navarro-Valls said that the doctors had explained to the Pope what they wanted to do on Tuesday morning, March 29, and he agreed. Third, in Schiavo’s case, the tube was a matter of life or death. With the Pope, the tube was a tool intended to speed his recovery. He was able to consume food without it, though not enough to ensure that he didn’t become underweight. In the end, the Pope’s condition turned out to be just as grave as Schiavo’s, despite these differences in the feeding apparatus.

Some commentators were struck by the juxtaposition of the two highly public deaths, one of which, at least to those on the front lines of the pro-life movement, seemed to illustrate the logic of a “culture of death”; the other, a stirring witness to the “culture of life.” In that sense, in the eyes of some observers, John Paul’s lifelong sense of dramatic timing was once again right on the money; even his death, against the backdrop of wide public fascination with end-of-life issues, turned out to be a much discussed teaching moment.

Thursday, March 31

In a terse statement issued at 10:15 p.m. Rome time, Navarro-Valls acknowledged that John Paul II had been struck with a high fever provoked by a urinary tract infection, and that treatment with antibiotics had been initiated. The statement also said that the Pope’s condition “is being closely monitored by the Vatican medical team, which has him under their care.” This latest health shock renewed speculation that John Paul might once again have to go to the Gemelli Hospital, but Navarro-Valls repeatedly insisted that no such hospitalization was anticipated.

Medical experts around the world, who had been stressing that none of the Pope’s problems were necessarily fatal and that recovery was still a realistic possibility, now began to grow much more pessimistic. Crowds began to swell in St. Peter’s Square, as the realization dawned that this pope of nine lives, who had so often outlived predictions of his own demise, might not have another miracle up his sleeve. Around the world, Catholics began not so much to pray that John Paul would recover, but that his passing would be peaceful and happy.

Friday, April 1

During a noon briefing in the Vatican Press Office, Navarro-Valls released a detailed update on John Paul’s condition. It called the Pope’s condition “very grave,” and said that the day before the Pope had suffered septic shock and cardio-circulatory collapse. Septic shock involves both bacteria in the blood and a consequent overrelaxing of the blood vessels, so that the vessels, which are normally narrow and taut, get floppy in reaction to the bacteria and can’t sustain any pressure. That loss of blood pressure is usually catastrophic, making the heart work harder and harder to compensate for the collapse. Even the hearts of fit and healthy people struggle with septic shock, and given John Paul’s general weakness, it seemed clear to everyone that hope was fading fast.

Navarro-Valls indicated that John Paul, informed of the gravity of his condition, had decided to remain in the Vatican rather than to return to the Gemelli, and that all possible medical interventions could be carried out just as well in his apartments as they could in the hospital. Navarro-Valls said that in the afternoon of March 31 there had been a temporary stabilization in the Pope’s condition, followed by further deterioration. The Pope received the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick (which had been formerly known as The Last Rites), he said, and remained lucid. At 6:00 a.m. on April 1, he concelebrated Mass from his sickbed. Navarro-Valls described John Paul as “extraordinarily serene.” At 7:15 a.m., Navarro-Valls said, the Pope requested the reading of the fourteen Stations of the Cross, representing the steps Jesus took to death and burial in Jerusalem. “He crossed himself at the reading of each station,” Navarro-Valls said.

Perhaps the most telling indication of the true gravity of the situation came at the end of the briefing, when Navarro-Valls choked back tears as he walked away from the platform where he spoke to reporters. Navarro-Valls is ordinarily a poised, highly composed man, a spokesperson who has learned over more than twenty years of service how to camouflage his emotions beneath a poker face. Reporters who have worked with him for more than twenty years struggled to recall another moment when he lost his cool in such a public fashion. The sight of him overcome with emotion, more than any of the words he spoke, communicated to longtime Vatican-watchers that the end was near.

“This is surely an image I have never seen in these twenty-six years,” Navarro-Valls said of the Pope’s condition, beginning to cry as he left the room.

In another sign of the extraordinary nature of the situation, Navarro-Valls announced that the Vatican Press Office would remain open all night for reporters awaiting the latest information. Given that the office normally closes each day at 3:00 p.m., this, too, was an obvious concession that the death of the Pope could come at any moment.

Later in the day, Navarro-Valls issued another bulletin. “The general conditions and cardiorespiratory conditions of the Holy Father have further worsened,” he said. “A gradual worsening of arterial hypotension has been noted, and breathing has become shallow. The clinical picture indicates cardio-circulatory and renal insufficiency. . . . The biological parameters are notably compromised.”

Once again, rumors swept Rome in this period. One had it that John Paul had actually died in the early morning on Friday, and that the Vatican was holding off on an official announcement until preparations were in place. That theory, dissipated when Navarro-Valls announced the names of several senior aides who had seen him and spoken with him in his room that morning, including Cardinal Edmund Szoka from the United States, the former governor of the Vatican city-state, who recalled the minutes he spent with the Pope on American television.

“As soon as he saw me, he recognized me,” Szoka told the “CBS Morning News” of his visit. “I blessed him, and as I did, he tried to make the sign of the cross. So he was perfectly lucid, perfectly conscious, but was having a great deal of trouble breathing.”

Another rumor made the rounds at roughly 8:30 p.m. Rome time, when Italian media reports indicated that the Pope’s electrocardiogram was flat, effectively meaning that he had died. SkyItalia, the Rupert Murdoch–owned Italian television news channel, reported that the Pope was dead, followed in short order by Fox News in the United States. CNN walked up to the brink of issuing the same report, but was pulled back by analyst Delia Gallagher, who insisted on-air that the network await official confirmation before reporting that the Pope was dead. In the end, the SkyItalia and Fox report, based on Italian wire services, turned out to be more than twenty-four hours premature.

Also on Friday, the Vatican released seventeen appointments of bishops and papal ambassadors, a clear signal that they wanted to move appointments already approved by the Pope through the pipeline while there was still time. These were not appointments made at the last minute, but rather appointments made some time prior that for one reason or another had been delayed. (Sometimes a new bishop will ask that his appointment be made on a particular day, such as the feast day of his patron saint, or a day with special importance in his nation or diocese.) Had John Paul died before the appointments were made public, they would have died with him, causing further delays in providing leadership for these dioceses or embassies.

Friday night, Cardinal Camillo Ruini, the Pope’s vicar for the diocese of Rome and a longtime confidant, celebrated a Mass for John Paul II at St. John Lateran Basilica, the Pope’s own diocesan church. Runi conceded that the end was not far away. “We pray for him,” Ruini said of the pontiff, “as we, like him, trust ourselves to the will of God.” In words that would prove fateful, Ruini then said: “The Holy Father can already touch and see the Lord.” Archbishop Angelo Comastri, the pope’s vicar for Vatican City, was equally candid: “This evening or this night, Christ opens the door to the Pope,” he said.

Saturday, April 2

In a noontime briefing, Navarro-Valls reiterated that John Paul’s condition remained “very grave,” and offered the first hints that the Pope might be losing consciousness, though he insisted that he was not in a “coma.”

“The Pope’s overall condition, both cardiorespiratory and metabolic, remains basically unchanged and thus very serious,” Navarro-Valls said. “At dawn today, it was observed that his consciousness was beginning to become compromised.”

“Sometimes he closes his eyes and sometimes he opens them” and “when he hears voices, he sometimes reacts,” Navaro-Valls said. “He sometimes appears to be sleeping, to be resting with his eyes closed,” he said. Navarro-Valls said the eighty-four-year-old pontiff had made repeated efforts to say one phrase in particular. He said observers had managed with difficulty to piece the words together, and that they seemed to be “I have looked for you. Now you have come to me and I thank you.” The spokesman said the phrase appeared to refer to the young faithful in particular who had gathered below his window in St. Peter’s Square, to pray for his well-being. Meanwhile the square swelled with pilgrims awaiting what now seemed the inevitable news of John Paul’s death.

Saturday evening, a special rosary was prayed in the square for the Pope, led by Sandri, who had been his public voice throughout this crisis. Just as that rosary ended, the news for which everyone had been waiting began to break.

The End

Finally, death came for Karol Wojtyla, who, as John Paul II, had stood astride his times as few global leaders ever had. At 9:55 p.m. Rome time, Vatican reporters’ cell phones flashed an SMS message indicating that an urgent declaration from Navarro-Valls was in their e-mail box. That notice read:

The Holy Father died this evening at 9:37 pm in his private apartment. All the procedures envisioned in the apostolic constitution Universi Dominici gregis promulgated by John Paul II on February 22, 1996, have been set in motion.

Most reporters never got past the first four words, immediately swinging into motion with long-prepared plans for coverage of John Paul’s passing and its aftermath.

Later, members of the Pope’s most intimate circle said that John Paul II had died just as a Mass led by his private secretary, Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz, had ended. Saturday was the vigil Mass for the Feast of Divine Mercy, a devotion associated with the Polish St. Faustina Kowalska, whom John Paul canonized on April 30, 2000, making her the first saint of the new millennium. The devotion to Christ’s divine mercy is rooted in a series of revelations Faustina believed she received from Jesus, Mary, and saints such as Teresa from 1931 to 1938, and the heart of her message is that human beings cannot be merciful to one another unless they first acknowledge their dependence on God’s mercy. John Paul always believed it was no accident that this message of mercy was revealed to a Polish nun between the two world wars, in a moment of supreme mercilessness. Once again, therefore, the Pope’s timing even in death was flawless, as he put a spotlight one final time on a devotion so near to his heart.

There were also reports that the Pope’s last word, at the end of the Mass that began around 8:00 p.m. Rome time, was “Amen.” Some observers expressed skepticism that he would be capable of speaking, given the respiratory difficulties that plagued him in his final days. Nevertheless, it seems fair to assume that “Amen” was in his heart if not on his lips as that Mass drew to a close. In Aramaic, the dialect of Hebrew that Jesus spoke, “Amen” means “yes,” and if ever there was a man who said a resounding “yes” to both life and death, it was Pope John Paul II.

At the Pope’s bedside for that final Mass were his closest friends and collaborators. Dziwisz was there, his private secretary for almost forty years, and the closest thing to a son this loving father ever had. Also in the room was Cardinal Marian Jaworski, the archbishop of L’viv in Ukraine, who served as a young priest together with Wojtyla in Poland. Back in those days, Jaworski had lost one of his hands in a train accident on his way to a pastoral assignment that Wojtyla had asked him to cover, and ever since Jaworski has worn a metal device under a black glove where his hand once was. A sign of the intimacy between the two men was that in earlier years, when Jaworski would come to Rome and stay in the papal apartment, Wojtyla would cut his meat for his old friend. Also present at the Pope’s deathbed was Archbishop Stanislaw Rylko, president of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, another old Polish associate; Monsignor Mieczyslaw Mokrzycki, Dzwisiz’s deputy; and Fr. Tadeusz Styczen. Three Polish sisters who took care of the papal household were also by the Pope’s side, including Sr. Tobiana, their superior, an ever-present shadow during John Paul’s life. Whenever the Pope traveled, Tobiana was with him, always carrying the black bag that contained his medicines. At the moment the Pope died, this group broke out into the hymn Te Deum Laudamus, often sung to thank God for some special blessing. In this case, the blessing was the life and happy death of Pope John Paul II.

The Pope’s body was taken to his private chapel for a final farewell from his household and most intimate collaborators, images of which for the first time were recorded and later released for broadcast by the Vatican Television Center. Then the body was moved to the Sala Clementina, where the first ripples of what would become a tidal wave of humanity, come to pay their respects, began to build.

TAKING STOCK

Oddly enough, having prepared for the death of John Paul II night and day for more than five years, having run through endless scenarios on both logistical and journalistic fronts, the one thing that I never anticipated is that I would have a personal, emotional response when the moment finally came. After all, a man had died, and not just any man—John Paul loomed large in my life, to say nothing of the billions of lives he touched around the world. I met him eight times, traveled with him to twenty-one nations, and probably wrote, all told, millions of words about him. While I realize there are reasonable criticisms to be made of various aspects of his papacy, what seems beyond question is that he was a man of deep faith and integrity, a good person striving by his lights to serve God, the Church, and humanity. His final days taught me—taught all of us—how to face impending death with both grit and grace, and it’s a lesson I will never forget.

All that came to a crescendo during the funeral Mass, as I was sitting next to Christiane Amanpour and my colleague Delia Gallagher on the CNN set overlooking St. Peter’s Square, watching the Papal Gentlemen pick up the Pope’s casket and turn it around for one final farewell to the crowd. At that moment I had to choke back tears, realizing in an instant that I would never write another sentence about John Paul II in the present tense. I flashed on memories of burying my own grandfather not long ago, and once again I felt I had suffered a loss that was in some sense irreplaceable.

This is not the place for an evaluation of John Paul II’s life and legacy. In the immediate aftermath of his death, lengthy obituaries were published around the world, including my own of more than nine thousand words, which can still be found on the Web site of the National Catholic Reporter. Historians, Vatican writers, and others will be sorting through his record for decades to come, and it will take time for his enormous impact on the Catholic Church and the wider world to emerge with clarity. John Paul was a complex man who ruled in turbulent times, and there is a legitimate discussion to come about particular choices he made or policies he pursued. A great man does not always accomplish great things, and certainly his reign had its ups and downs. New biographies and new studies will soon line the shelves alongside what was already a massive collection of literature devoted to his life, thought, and almost twenty-seven-year-long pontificate, the third longest in the almost two-thousand-year history of Roman Catholicism.

Suffice it here to close with a few fleeting words, some final impressions about a man whose passing leaves a psychological and emotional hole that will be difficult to fill.

What, then, to say of Pope John Paul II toward the end? That image of him sitting slumped over in his rolling throne (the Vatican would never call it a “wheelchair”), his eyes either closed or frozen, his face contorted. Was it pain, anxiety, a crushing sense of so much still to do? In the final analysis, Karol Wojtyla, deeper than his politics and beyond his early-twentieth-century Polish Catholic cultural formation, was a mensch. He was a strong, intelligent, committed human being, someone whose integrity and dedication represent a standard by which other leaders can be measured.

John Paul was a selfless figure in a me-first world. Cardinal Roberto Tucci, who planned John Paul’s voyages before retiring in 2001, once said he had briefed John Paul hundreds of times on the details for his various trips. Not once, Tucci said, did the Pope ever ask where he was going to sleep, what he would eat or wear, or what his creature comforts would be. The same indifference to himself could be seen every time the Pope stepped, or, in the end, was rolled upon the public stage.

This is the key that unlocks why John Paul drew enormous crowds, even where his specific political or doctrinal stands may be unpopular. It’s a rare ideologue for whom condoms or the Latin Mass represent ultimate concerns. Deeper than politics, either secular or ecclesiastical, lies the realm of personal integrity—goodness and holiness, the qualities we prize most in colleagues, family, and friends. A person may be liberal or conservative, avant-grade or traditional, but let him or her be decent, and most of the time that’s enough. This realm of menschlichkeit, authentic humanity, is where John Paul’s appeal came from. For a Pope of a hundred trips and a million words, perhaps the most important lesson he offered was the coherence of his own life. When he urged Christians to Duc in Altum , to set off into the deep, it resonated even with those who sought very different shores.

When I was asked on CNN at the end of his long funeral Mass to sum up my feelings on the passing of John Paul II, what came to mind were Hamlet’s words reflecting on the death of his own father: “He was a man. Take him for all in all, I shall not look upon his like again.”

I don’t expect to ever see another pope, or another man, quite like John Paul II.