He loved the most the last part of the paths. Having mountains in the background, from the Pilate’s chapel he prayed the Stations of the Cross. Kalwaria Zebrzydowska was close to his heart. He made pilgrimages there from an early age. When he first came to Kalwaria as Pope in 1979, he began his speech by saying: “I really do not know how to thank Divine Providence for granting me to revisit this place.” He was touched. He then recalled that during his episcopal and cardinal ministry, on the Kalwaria’s paths, he entrusted to Jesus through Mary “especially difficult and uniquely responsible problems”. “I noticed – he said – that more often I have to come here because, firstly, there were more and more such problems, and secondly, a strange thing, they usually were solved after such a visitation on the paths. I can tell you today, my dear ones, that almost none of these things, which sometimes disturb the bishop’s heart and, in any case, stimulate his sense of responsibility, have matured as here, by praying it in the face of the great mystery of the faith that Kalwaria has within itself.” At that time John Paul II named what many later talked about over the years. His life, his pontificate, matured on the cross, which he carried on his increasingly tired back. In 1991, when he visited Kalwaria only for a moment, he said: “today I only briefly stay here. But, here my heart has been forever.”
With the consent of Archbishop Mieczysław Mokrzycki – “A place for everyone”
Znak Publishing House, Kraków 2013.
