The Humility of Pope Francis (Part 2)

Fiction: In 1963, Morris West wrote the novel ‘Shoes of the Fisherman’ which became a number one best seller. The ‘Fisherman’ refers to St. Peter. The word ‘Shoes’ refers to his successors. You can read the book online and the movie on YouTube. The story is about Russian priest Kiril Lakota of the Russian Orthodox Catholic Church who was a Gulag Siberian camp prisoner for 17 years. When freed, he continued his ministry until he was made Archbishop of the Russian Orthodox Church. (The premise of author Morris West was that the Roman Catholic Church and the Orthodox Churches of Russia, (the biggest among the Orthodox churches) Armenia, Serbia, Romania, Greece have been reunited.) In the story, the Pope died and Archbishop Kiril attended the conclave to elect a new Pope. He was elected and became the first Russian Slavic Pope.

West’s foresight is uncanny. In 1963, when he wrote the book, for 200 years the Popes were all Italian, until in the 70’s when a non-Italian Pope was elected – Pope John Paul II, a Polish, later followed by Pope Benedict XVI, a German and now Pope Francis, an Argentinian.

In the novel, bad climate created worldwide drought and famine. Very few nations had extra food. Russia, with about a 1000 km boundary with China, had surplus food. The famine stricken nations want to invade neighboring nations who had food and water. China with its big population, because of hunger, was getting restless. Nuclear war was expected between East and West, between China and Russia. Pope Kiril and the Russian President had known each other for years. They became acquainted when Kiril was imprisoned. Pope Kiril went to Moscow to ask the President not to go to war. The President said he did not want war but China will invade Russia to get their food supplies so the Pope should talk to the Chinese President. The Pope did not know the Chinese President yet he went to Beijing. The Chinese President, because of the long drought and no money to buy food also did not want war. The President, said that he could not lead a hungry people. They would remove and kill him and will go to war to have food. Pope Kiril, (played by actor Anthony Quinn) and the Russian President, (played by Laurence Olivier), again talked. The Pope sold all the Vatican/Church properties. He used the money to buy food for all the hungry nations, especially China. Thus ended the world crisis. The side story was about Fr. Telemond, a brilliant explorer, scientist, writer, theologian and papal adviser. He was having a deep serious crisis about his faith and was afraid that he might lose faith and rely on human reason only. The touching part of this story was while dying of brain cancer and given blessing by Pope Kiril, he regained his bearings. He died peacefully in the arms of Pope Kiril. This was inspired by the story of French priest Jesuit Fr. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, one of the most original Theologian, writer, thinker and scientist/paleontologist of the 20th century.

FACT: Fr. Teilhard did not die of brain cancer.

FACT: Novelist Morris West was inspired by the true story of 2 Ukrainian bishops: Cardinal Josyl Slipsi and Bishop Hryhory Lakota. They were released in 1963 after being imprisoned in Siberia for many years through the efforts of Pope John 23 and U.S. President John F. Kennedy.