The Polish Sayings of John Paul II

To the congregations of the "Church off Silence": Is it not Christ's will that this Pope, in whose heart is deeply engraved the history of his own nation from its very beginning, and also the history of brother peoples and neighboring peoples, should in a special way manifest and confirm in our age the presence of these peoples in the church and their specific contribution to the history of Christianity? He [the Pope] comes here to speak before the whole church, before Europe and the world, of those often forgotten nations and peoples. He comes here to cry "with a loud voice." He comes here to embrace all these peoples, together with his own nation, and to hold them close to the heart of the church.

Religion and the Polish past: When national and state structures were lacking, society, for the most part Catholic, found support in the hierarchical order of the church. And this helped society to overcome the times of the partition of the country and the times of the occupation. It helped society to maintain, and even to deepen its understanding of, the awareness of its own identity. Perhaps certain people from other countries may consider this situation "untypical," but for the Poles it has an unmistakable eloquence. It is simply a part of the truth of the history of our own motherland.

In Warsaw's Victory Square: The exclusion of Christ from the history of man is an act against man. Without Christ it is impossible to understand the history of Poland, especially the history of a people who have passed or are passing through this land. It is impossible without Christ to understand this nation, with its past so full of splendor and also of terrible difficulties.

For Poland's Unknown Soldier: I wished to kneel before this tomb to venerate every seed that falls into the earth and dies and thus bears fruit. All that, the history of the motherland shaped for a thousand years by the succession of generations-- among them the present generation and the coming generation-- and by each son and daughter of the motherland, even if they are anonymous and unknown like the soldier before whose tomb we are now. All that, including the history of the peoples that have lived with us and among us, such as those who died in their hundreds of thousands within the walls of the Warsaw ghetto. All that, I embrace in thought and in my heart.

On the future task of Christianity: Christianity must commit itself anew to the formation of the spiritual unity of Europe. Economic and political reasons cannot do it. We must go deeper, to ethical reasons. All the episcopates and churches in Europe have here a great task to perform.

At the shrine of the Black Madonna: The history of Poland can be written in different ways; especially in the case of the history of the last centuries, it can be interpreted along different lines. But if we want to know how this history is interpreted by the heart of the Poles, we must come here, we must listen to this shrine, we must hear the echo of the life of the whole nation in the heart of its mother and queen. And if her heart beats with a tone of disquiet, if it echoes with solicitude and the cry for the conversion and strengthening of consciences, this invitation must be accepted.

Indirectly to the Soviet Union: International reconciliation depends on recognition of and respect for the rights of each nation. The chief rights are the rights to existence and self-determination -- to its own culture and the many forms of developing it. We know from our own country's history what has been the cost to us of infraction, violation and denial of these inalienable rights.

On the Jewish people (at Auschwitz): I kneel before all the inscriptions that come one after another bearing the memory of the victims, before the inscription in Hebrew. This inscription awakens the memory of the people whose sons and daughters were intended for total extermination. This people draws its origin from Abraham, our father in faith, as was expressed by Saul of Tarsus. The very people that received from God the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" it self experienced in a special measure what is meant by killing. It is not permissible for anyone to pass by this inscription with indifference.

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