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 Coronation Pope John XXIII Scott 250-253 (1959) The Feast of Saint Pope John XXIII is celebrated on October 11. Unlike most other saints, whose feast days are celebrated on either the dates of their births or deaths (or in close proximity to those dates), this feast coincides with the date of the opening of the Second Vatican Council on October 11, 1961. Pope John XXIII convened Vatican II, but died prior to its completion. Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli (1881-1963) served as Pope John XXIII from 1958 to 1963, following the pontificate of Pope Pius XII (1939-1958). He was born into a family of frugal peasant farmers at Santo il Monte, near Bergamo (Lombardy), the eldest son in a family of 13. He attended local seminaries and was ordained in 1904 with a doctorate in theology from the Pontifical Athenaeum St. Apollinare Institute in Rome. He served as secretary to the bishop of Bergamo, taught church history at a seminary, and was conscripted into the army to serve as an orderly and chaplain during World War I. Pope Benedict XV appointed Roncalli as national director of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith in 1921. Pope Pius XI started Roncalli on a diplomatic career serving as the Holy See’s representative to Bulgaria, Turkey, Greece, and France, the latter two posts during World War II. He was created a cardinal and appointed Patriarch of Venice in 1953 and was to be the third patriarch of that see to become pope in the twentieth century, along with Popes Pius X and John Paul I. At age 77, he was elected pope on the 12th ballot following the death of Pius XII. He announced three goals for his pontificate: revision of canon law, a diocesan synod for Rome, and an ecumenical council. Historian J. N. D. Kelly describes the calling of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) as “a sudden inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Its objective he later explained, was to be a new Pentecost, a means of regeneration for the church bringing its teaching, discipline, and organization up to date, and opening a way towards the reunion of the separated brethren of east and west.”Preparatory commissions were established, and the Council opened at St. Peter’s Basilica on 11 October 1961. The pope did not participate in Council meetings but intervened during the first session directing a rewrite of the decree on divine revelation. Pope John established a commission to reform canon law in 1962. A liturgical reform included insertion of St. Joseph into the canon of the Mass. He also removed words offensive to Jews from the Good Friday liturgy. Among Pope John’s encyclicals were Mater et magistra (1961, on social teachings) and Pacem in terris (1963, on human rights and world peace). Pope John also established the Secretariat for Christian Unity, and greetings were exchanged with Patriarch Athenagoras of Constantinople and Patriarch Alexis of Moscow. He received the Archbishop of Canterbury in Rome, and sent observers to a World Council of Churches meeting in Delhi, India. He renewed the practice in Rome of a pope’s visit to parishes and the tradition of visiting Regina Coeli Prison and a hospital at Christmas. His successors continued these initiatives. The last pope to openly smoke cigarettes, John XXIII died of stomach cancer on 3 June 1963. He was beatified in 2000 by Pope John Paul II and canonized in 2014 by Pope Francis. Historian Kelly describes Pope John as: “warm hearted and unaffectedly simple in spite of his erudition and command of many languages, attached to his humble origins and always retaining a peasant’s shrewdness and jovial humour. John brought a wind of change of his office, relaxing its hieratic stiffness and, after decades of growing centralization giving the episcopate a new awareness of its importance.”  50th Anniversary of the Death of Pope John XXIII Scott 1531 (2013) 
 Left: Beatification of Pope John XXIII (Scott 1166, 2000) Right: Canonization of Saint Pope John XXIII (Scott 1557, 2014) REFERENCES: |
