At midnight, John Paul II welcomed the New Year in a very intimate group. There were few such Masses in a private chapel during the year. The Archbishop says that probably only two: the one at midnight on New Year’s Eve and the one on May 13, on each subsequent anniversary of the assassination. At the altar, only the household members met: John Paul II, two secretaries and five Sisters of the Sacred Heart. Sometimes another employee of the Curia – says the Archbishop. I don’t know why that was. I never asked. The Holy Father wanted to say goodbye to the old year in silence and concentration and welcome the new one. He had a lot to go over with God. After all, so much had happened and so much was yet to happen. After the holy Mass, when they left the chapel, they made New Year’s wishes to each other. After the last such holy Mass, when they welcomed the year 2005, supposedly it was as usual. And, similar wishes. The Holy Father wished us, as every year, that we would continue to be together – recalls the Archbishop. And, for everything to go well. At home. Because things were going wrong in the world. And, John Paul II experienced it very much. When I watched the Holy Father kneel in this chapel, so weak and hunched, I had the impression that he was carrying all these armed conflicts, poverty and suffering of people all over the world on his old shoulders. The Archbishop says that he is actually sure that this was the case, because it was enough to listen to what the Pope said during official speeches, during homilies, blessings, during general audiences. He had all the evil of the world in his head. – The Archbishops goes deep into his thoughts. – That night, when the old year ended and the new one began, he had to think about it. Because that was what he had in his heart the most. There were the moments – as the Archbishop says – when you saw John Paul II immersed in prayer, completely absent. As if we didn’t exist, we all around him. There was only him and Christ. Father Styczeń once wondered whether when the Holy Father was speaking to us at the Christmas Eve table, was really he speaking to us or whether Christ was speaking to us, or maybe Christ the Lord and his faithful Apostle, who was the Holy Father, was speaking.
With the consent of Archbishop Mieczysław Mokrzycki – “Place for everyone”
Znak Publishing House, Kraków 2013.
