In an unexpected gesture yesterday, Pope Leo XIV stopped at the exact spot in St Peter’s Square where, 45 years ago, St John Paul II was shot in an assassination attempt. Source: EWTN News.
Pope Leo got out of his vehicle and remained in silence to pray before the white marble plaque marking the place where the Polish pope was struck by four gunshots fired by the Turkish gunman Ali Agca on May 13, 1981. Leo then knelt and touched the plaque before continuing his ride around the square, greeting people gathered for his weekly General Audience.
The attack on St John Paul II coincided with the anniversary of the apparitions of Our Lady to three shepherd children in Fátima, Portugal.
Days after the attempt on his life, while still recovering, St John Paul II read the third part of the secret of Fátima, until then known only to the popes and later made public.
Written by one of the seers, Sr Lucia, it describes the vision of the Holy Father “afflicted with pain and sorrow,” praying “for the souls of the corpses he met on his way.”
Pope John Paul II never ceased to express his gratitude to the Virgin Mary for saving his life. “One hand fired; another guided the bullet,” he said in an interview with the French writer André Frossard.
After being discharged from the hospital and resuming general audiences in St Peter’s Square following five months of hospitalisation, he also said he had experienced “the extraordinary maternal protection which proved stronger than the deadly projectile”.
Today, Leo XIV wanted to underscore that the attempt on John Paul II’s life was not fatal “thanks to the protection of Our Lady, as he himself confirmed in many ways.”
For this reason, he explained, he dedicated yesterday’s catechesis to “the Virgin Mary, model of the Church” and to his predecessor, whose motto was Totus Tuus.
Pope Leo continued his cycle of catechesis on the Second Vatican Council, pausing on the final chapter of the dogmatic constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium, which is dedicated to the Virgin Mary.
He said Mary “is hailed as a preeminent and singular member of the Church, and as its type and excellent example in faith and charity”.
“Mary is the perfect model of what the whole Church is called to be: a creature of the Word of the Lord and mother of the children of God, begotten in docility to the action of the Holy Spirit,“ the Holy Father said.
FULL STORY
Pope Leo prays where St. John Paul II was shot on feast of Our Lady of Fátima (By Victoria Cardiel, EWTN News)
