Sangue del vostro sangue, ossa delle vostre ossa

The Pontificate of John Paul II (1978-2005) and the Churches in Central and Eastern Europe. On the centenary of the birth of Karol Wojtyla

by Jan Mikrut
(Verona, Gabrielli Editori, 2020)

"This pope, blood of your blood, bones of your bones": this is how John Paul II declared himself on June 3, 1979 during his first trip to Poland. He addressed all the Christians of Central and Eastern Europe. It was not a political proclamation, but the expression of the charisma of the "Polish pope, Slavic pope" just now called to show "the spiritual unity of Christian Europe". The volume edited by Prof. Jan Mikrut from the Pontifical Gregorian University contains more than fifty contributions related to the pontificate of John Paul II and his relations with the countries and Churches of Central and Eastern Europe; the authors are leading figures at the ecclesiastical, academic and institutional level, offering the result of researches carried out and the most recent literature.

The voices of Catholic authors, both Latin and Greek-Catholic, and Orthodox authors are offered here: they deal from their point of view with Pope Wojtyła's relations with their traditions and their countries; for him, Europe must breathe "two lungs, that is, eastern and western" which has become a paradigm of ecumenism.