Saint John Paul II and the Polish Catholic Experience
Raymond GawronskiMaryland Province
Fr. Raymond Gawronski, S.J. (Dominican School of Philosophy & Theology, Berkeley)
cosponsored by The Copernicus Foundation, Calvert House, and the Polish American Student Association
Often referred to as “The Polish Pope,” John Paul II is better described as a global pope. The Polish experience offers a unique perspective that bore fruit in the person of Pope John Paul II, who held the world’s attention for decades and offered a way to be Catholic in the Church’s new situation of worldly powerlessness. Through the lens of the Polish experience in Europe and America – the “Polish hermeneutic” – this talk will explore the contribution of the person and work of St. John Paul II to the Church and world.
This lecture commemorates the April 27 canonization of Pope John Paul II.
Native New Yorker Fr. Raymond Gawronski (1950-2016) was a Jesuit of the Maryland Province. Student of the work of Hans Urs von Balthasar, he authored Word and Silence: Hans Urs von Balthasar and the Spiritual Encounter Between East and West. He wrote extensively on dogmatic and mystical theology, spirituality, American culture, and Polish and Slavic topics. He was a lecturer at Georgetown University, professor of theology at Marquette University, professor and spiritual director at the St. John Vianney Seminary in Denver, and a Visiting Scholar at the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology in Berkeley, California. He spent the last two years of his life serving as a spiritual director and professor at St. Patrick’s Seminary in Menlo Park.
