Pope Begins Visit to France Amid Concern Over Health

It was another red carpet in the morning rain and it must have seemed long. With the president of France inching protectively alongside, Karol Wojtyla limped gamely down it. An aide held a white umbrella. People held their breath.

There was a gift of flowers from two children, national anthems, review of an honor guard, pleasantries with government officials, fraternal greetings to bishops in black robes and purple caps. It went like clockwork. Sighs of relief.

Thus on a dank, autumnal Thursday in western France did ailing Pope John Paul II launch the 75th foreign trip of his extraordinary reign.

The pope was hurting but still on the job.

John Paul even shunned his cane, which, like backup medical aid, now is an integral feature of the papal retinue.

A major theme underlying the pope’s four-day visit here is international concern for his health. This French sojourn is preface to surgery in another few weeks for removal of what the Vatican describes as John Paul’s chronically inflamed appendix.

“You remain the tireless pilgrim of the absolute, who, ceaselessly and everywhere, appeals to mankind’s dignity, to his generosity and grandeur, and who works for peace,” French President Jacques Chirac said in salute to the 76-year-old pontiff. In a traditionally Roman Catholic country where only about 15% actively practice their faith--and where John Paul has opponents as well as supporters--Thursday’s crowds were modest but enthusiastic.

Reporters who traveled with John Paul from Rome on Thursday thought he looked well. He was alert and markedly more robust than on a sapping visit to Hungary two weeks ago, they said.

Here, the pope’s French was liquid and his spirits good. He tired visibly on a day that included three speeches, repeated stand-up appearances in his “Popemobile” and two hourlong rides in a French military helicopter.

Still, while darkness fell and an organist ad-libbed arpeggios of farewell, the pope delayed his departure after a day’s-end service at a shrine to shake hands in animated fashion and give blessings to worshipers.

The Vatican announced last weekend that John Paul would undergo the surgery on the troubling appendix, but aides say he decided to press on with the French trip--with 21 public appearances--after personally reviewing the stop-by-stop logistics.

Insiders said Thursday that plans call for John Paul to enter Gemelli Hospital in Rome after presiding at a major beatification ceremony at St. Peter’s on Oct. 6. The operation would quickly follow, with the pope remaining in the hospital for a week and convalescing for another week thereafter, either at the Vatican or at his summer residence at Castel Gandolfo south of Rome. The hope is that he will feel fully recovered by Nov. 1, the golden anniversary of his ordination as a priest in 1946.

Increasingly stooped, John Paul has shuffled since hip surgery in 1994. The Vatican says he also suffers from a nervous disorder similar to Parkinson’s disease; his left hand shakes. Reading one of his speeches Thursday, John Paul held the text in his right hand and firmly gripped the microphone stand with his left.

Three times this year, John Paul has been troubled by bacterial ailments his doctors ascribe to the inflamed appendix. He maintains his normal administrative and ceremonial duties at the Vatican, though, and his illness has not interrupted his foreign travels.

The French visit, which ends Sunday, is the sixth and most controversial of the year for a pope who, since 1978, has traveled farther than his 263 predecessors combined.

Leftists say John Paul will be violating the separation of church and state with his planned commemoration in the city of Reims on Sunday of the 1,500th anniversary of the baptism of King Clovis, a founder of France. But neither the pope nor Chirac on Thursday used France’s honorary title as “eldest daughter of the church,” and John Paul skirted the traditional Catholic view that Clovis’ conversion from paganism amounted to the baptism of France.

Many French Catholics actively challenge papal teachings on dogma, such as priestly celibacy and issues like abortion and artificial birth control. Weekend demonstrations by leftists are scheduled here, in Reims and in Paris.