John Paul II’s Wide-Ranging Influence

One of Pope John Paul II’s strongest legacies is that he consistently spoke out for life. While consistently opposing abortion, he also called for a consensus to end the death penalty, which he called “cruel and unnecessary.” And he called for an end to war.

Many conservatives in the United States have not accepted the wisdom of the pope with regard to war and the death penalty. I hope they do in the future.

David Atwood

Houston

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While the article “Innovator Revised Papacy” (news analysis, April 3) addresses many aspects of the papacy of John Paul II, one of the most significant acts is omitted and the name of the world’s greatest physicist is not even mentioned.

It took over 350 years to do so, but the Catholic Church finally, formally, publicly admitted, under the papacy of John Paul II, that Galileo Galilei was correct in his belief in the Copernican (sun-centered) system of planetary motion and the Catholic Church was wrong, and wrong in using the threat of force to cause him to recant his scientific views under the threat of torture.

It is unlikely that this remarkable admission by this powerful world body would have taken place under any other pope.

Winfield J. Abbe

Athens, Ga.

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Pope John Paul II has been a symbol of peace and hope for the world’s Catholics and many others, including Muslims. He made history by becoming the first leader of the Catholic Church to visit a mosque. When he prayed at the Umayyad Mosque (which contains the tomb of John the Baptist) in Damascus, a symbolic dialogue was initiated. His actions were similar to those of Omar Bin Khattab, the second Caliph, who offered Salah (worship) in the Church of the Nativity, almost 1,500 years ago in Bethlehem.

The pope’s gesture, like Omar’s, was to promote the ties between Christianity and Islam. He achieved this.

Many Christians are surprised when they learn that Muslims believe that Jesus Christ will return to Earth and that all Muslims will follow him as God’s representative. The pope, no doubt, was aware of this common ground.

Fawzia Gilani

Oberlin, Ohio

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The passing of any decent human being from our benighted world is cause for sorrow, and the demise of the pope is certainly no exception. But I am a little puzzled, perhaps because of my Protestant upbringing, by the universal lamentation at the loss of a great leader as a man who represented freedom. Pope John Paul II’s administration was autocratic from its inception, and never admitted dissent. He was certainly anti-fascist and anti-communist, but no reasonable judgment could qualify his values as being remotely democratic.

The strict autonomy of the church is still strict autonomy, whether divine or secular. True lovers of freedom must reject the entire concept of ultimate authority, whatever its origins.

I mourn the passing of a great moral and conscientious man. But I cannot, and will not, accept that the pope’s death validates the Roman Catholic Church’s stance on such issues as population control, assisted suicide and its avoidance of responsibility for the pedophiliac crimes of certain of its celebrants.

James Lincoln Warren

Los Angeles

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Re “Pontiff’s Choice Was to Die Simply,” April 4: Why don’t we coin a phrase “I want to die like the pope”? The pope’s way of dying really is the right way to die. First and foremost -- you make the choice. Then you accept and make peace with your departure. Then you die in dignity in your bed and in your familiar shell, living every last moment of your life to the fullest. You even have a chance to say goodbye to the people you love. Beats the Schiavo option any day of the week.

Batya Dagan

Los Angeles

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How long until he is known as John Paul the Great?

Kelly A. Dunnahoo

Saugus