In his famous dirge, “Blasphemy,” Tupac Shakur asked “Should we cry, when the Pope dies?/my request/we should cry if they cried when we buried Malcolm X.” The recent decline in the Pope’s health got me to thinking about this Pope and his legacy, and whether I, as an non-Catholic African American, should mourn his impending death.
Many Americans associate Pope John Paul II with his more conservative religious and political positions, such as his views on abortion, female priests, gay marriage, stem cell research, etc. Through the prism of American media, the Pope seems a typical, bull-headed conservative. But upon a closer look, we see a man who has challeneged American conventional wisdom for decades. For example, Pope John Paul II strongly opposed the war in Iraq; he opposed the death penalty; he openly admired Fidel Castro; he called for more spending on the poor and the end of world hunger; he criticized the US/Soviet arms race; he attacked the stifling of free thought under communism, while at the same time, criticizing unadulterated free markets; he criticized US environmental policy, etc.
So, with that in mind, and in response to Tupac, we should definitely cry when the Pope dies. Although I do not agree with him on everything, Pope John Paul II stood for many rights and causes now forgotten in an America mesmerized by television and corrupted by greed.
Here are some of my favorite quotes from Pope John Paul II: “The great danger for family life, in the midst of any society whose idols are pleasure, comfort and independence, lies in the fact that people close their hearts and become selfish.” “Young people are threatened… by the evil use of advertising techniques that stimulate the natural inclination to avoid hard work by promising the immediate satisfaction of every desire.“
Filed under: Uncategorized
