The End and the Begining: Pope John Paul II -- The Victory of Freedom, the Last Years, the Legacy, George Weigel's sequel to his memorable biography of the late pontiff, was released today. Weigel shared his thoughts with me in an interview posted on the National Catholic Register, where he discusses the key issues and unexpected developments that make his latest book so engaging.
What is the value of time for a biographer, even one who knew the flesh-and-blood man he is writing about?
Weigel: Obviously time gives one some emotional distance on the person about whom one is writing. But in my case, the most important “time factor” was the fact that I came into possession, after the Pope’s death and through the courtesy of Polish academic colleagues, of a cache of remarkable materials from the files of the Polish secret police and communist-era foreign ministry, the East German Stasi, the KGB, the Hungarian secret police, and the White House, none of which had been previously available. Those materials allowed me to explore the communist war against John Paul II in considerable (and dramatic) detail; some have said that the first third of The End and the Beginning reads like an espionage novel. And I expect there’s something to that.
In another exchange, Weigel addresses the pope's two-track strategy for dealing with communist regimes:
John Paul II sought to transform the Holy See’s policy of Ostpolitik by creating the foundation for the nonviolent overthrow of the Soviet empire. Yet he appointed Cardinal [Agostino] Casaroli, a strong advocate of Ostpolitik, as his secretary of state. Why did he do that, and what does that decision reflect about his approach to foreign policy? Other examples?
Weigel: I have long argued that the appointment of Casaroli, architect of the Ostpolitik of Paul VI, as John Paul II’s secretary of state, was an extremely shrewd move on John Paul’s part. With Casaroli as principal Vatican diplomatic agent, no communist government could accuse John Paul of reneging on Paul VI’s agreements or dramatically changing the Vatican’s policy line. Meanwhile, John Paul II himself went around and over the heads of governments with moral appeals to oppressed peoples around the world, calling them to live in the truth, which was his basic weapon against communism. It was a classic good cop-bad cop strategy.
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