Wow! That was fast. That opening for the position of pontifex maximus was filled right quick now, with Cardinal Rob’t. Prevost taking-up the title of Pope Leo XIV. Today’s music-video lede comes from the theme song inspired by the ministry of Pope John Paul II. We’ll never forget this banger, never…
The first visit Pope John Paul II made to the U.S. was in autumn 1979, our first year at Delbarton, seventh-grade. Bro. Jerome Borski, O.S.B., gave us a good survey course on the papacy during math class one day, going over mitres, cassocks, Ring of the Fisherman, etc. Bro. Borski was obviously proud that a fellow Pole had become Pope. This was in stark contrast, a few months earlier, to my music teacher, a proud Italian Catholic was was baffled by John Paul’s family name: WOJTYLA. Nonetheless, there was no disputing the new pope’s charisma. According to one of our fellow Delbarton boarders who made the trip to Shea Stadium to see him, as soon as the pontiff appeared to the crowd, the gloomy, rainy skies over the proceedings suddenly gave way to brilliant warm sunshine. A miracle!
Later, eight years later, 1987, you don’t think it’s a long time, but it brought us from junior-high to college junior, pretty much. John Paul II was on the road again, and this time we had to go check it out. It was a big display of youth devotion to the pontiff, 70,000-plus inside the New Orleans Superdome. By this time, no one was left unconvinced of John Paul’s political power, which pretty much helped tear the iron curtain asunder — the already legendary charisma was more or less godlike by that time.
A lot of us went, regardless of religious persuasion, I remember a bunch of the fraternity brother partaking of this, and not ironically or as a gag, either. They wanted to see this outsize expression of faith in action. So there we sat in the upper bowl of the Superdome; we were between Balto.-area Beltway tribesmen Levinson & Kolodner, the Pilipino sandwiched by the Jewish rye.
At any rate, as part of that 1987 Superdome papal extravaganza, they had a lot of young, innocent believers regaling the pope with dancing & stories & general heartfelt thanks. One of the acts was a guy who had been born without arms, or maybe he had lost them through war or abuse, the larger point being that he no longer had the two usual limbs hanging from his upper body. Yet he was able to play a song on the guitar for the pope, using only his feet. It was moving & mesmerizing, maybe even better than walking on water or restoring lepers & cripples to full health. The young man might have been playing this song, ‘Totus Tuus’, on his guitar or not. If not, then it was some immaculate young girl singing it sweetly to the pope.
Either way, we could never forget this song, even if the song itself was forgettable, if only because we were all, as a stadium full of human beings perhaps professing differing creeds or not believing at all — we were all encouraged to sing along with the young girl: Totus tuus, totally yours…
And that’s your Proustian time-slip for today…
Four nighttime tracks still in-play for your late Friday night now: Chas. Town, Century Mile Thoroughbreds, Evangeline & Prairie, the second & fourth of which have their Opening Night this evening…
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