San Francisco, Calif., Nov 1, 2005 / 22:00 pm
Even 8 months after his death, the world is still abuzz about the legacy of Pope John Paul II. The man who would take his place, good friend, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, now shares his own memories of the late Holy Father in a new volume called, The Legacy of John Paul II: Images and Memories.
The new book, released in October by San Francisco-based Ignatius Press, uses the words and memories of now-Pope Benedict XVI and the stunning images of Vatican photographer, Giancarlo Giuliani, to chronicle the three-decade long papacy of a man already being hailed as “John Paul the Great.”
The book includes an excerpt from then-Cardinal Ratzinger’s funeral homily for the late Pope, in which he recalls that “none of us will be able to forget how in that last Easter Sunday of his life, the Holy Father…came once more to the window of the Apostolic Palace and one last time gave his blessig Urbi et Orbi.”
“We can be sure”, the future pontiff added, “that our beloved Pope is standing today at the window of the Father’s house, that he sees us and blesses us.”