Whenever, returning from a walk in the Vatican Gardens, I walked along the Way of the Foundations and before my eyes appeared the inconspicuous triangular roof of the Sistine Chapel (and seen from a perspective that no one in the world knows, because only a handful of people have the right to go that way!), I thought about how unusually the prose of life can intertwine with great history. How many Popes have been elected within the walls of this chapel, how many millions of visitors a year admire its vault… Until October 16, 1978, for us, Poles, the so-called Sistine was simply a famous masterpiece of Michelangelo’s genius. After that day, it became a place dear to our hearts, a symbol of great change. I, as a Polish woman, looking at its contours, always felt a certain pride and closeness.
The October conclave was attended by one hundred and eleven Cardinals. Only eighteen of them were younger than Karol Wojtyła. The only Pole among them, apart from the future John Paul II, was Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński. And, it was he who, during the conclave, which the Holy Father himself later recounted, whispered to him: “If they choose, please do not refuse…”
Magdalena Wolińska-Riedi “It happened in the Vatican”
Znak Publishing House. Kraków 2020
pages: 26 – 27
