May this Centre, which we inaugurate by the grace of God, read with all realism in the context of history and our times all the signs in which the needs of the Church and Christianity in Poland, the needs of Polish culture and the expectations of others are expressed. May it be, in accordance with the tasks and possibilities, a place of encounter for pilgrims and their spiritual enrichment. May it reach out to all the cultures of other peoples who serve man and help him to determine his proper place in his own nation and in the world.
I cordially bless this work, putting all this work in the hands of Mary, Mother of good counsel and Seat of wisdom. Before I conclude, I would like to respond to the invitation addressed to me by the Primate on behalf of the Main Council of the Polish Episcopate and the Church in Poland: an invitation to next year’s jubilee of 600 years of our Lady of Jasna Góra’s stay in Her sanctuary at Jasna Góra. I would like to respond to this public, formal invitation, in the most personal way possible. So I say that I just feel invited there for a long time, and what we heard today from the mouth of the Primate is only a confirmation of what I feel, and probably after this invitation I am even more unable to resist this feeling.
(Audience on the occasion of the dedication of the Polish Home. Vatican, November 7, 1981)
“Do not stop in this good work – Papal Speeches to the John Paul II Foundation”
John Paul II Foundation & Center for Documentation and Study of the Pontificate of John Paul II, Rome 2012
