title: Manga

text: Modern "shōjo" manga romance features love as a major theme set into emotionally intense narratives of self-realization. With the superheroines, "shōjo" manga saw releases such as Pink Hanamori's "Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch", Reiko Yoshida's "Tokyo Mew Mew", and Naoko Takeuchi's "Pretty Soldier Sailor Moon", which became internationally popular in both manga and anime formats. Groups (or "sentais") of girls working together have also been popular within this genre. Like Lucia, Hanon, and Rina singing together, and Sailor Moon, Sailor Mercury, Sailor Mars, Sailor Jupiter, and Sailor Venus working together.


title: Manga

text: Manga for male readers sub-divides according to the age of its intended readership: boys up to 18 years old ("shōnen" manga) and young men 18 to 30 years old ("seinen" manga); as well as by content, including action-adventure often involving male heroes, slapstick humor, themes of honor, and sometimes explicit sex. The Japanese use different kanji for two closely allied meanings of "seinen"— for "youth, young man" and for "adult, majority"—the second referring to pornographic manga aimed at grown men and also called "seijin" ("adult" ) manga. "Shōnen", "seinen", and "seijin" manga share a number of features in common.


title: Manga

text: Boys and young men became some of the earliest readers of manga after World War II. From the 1950s on, "shōnen" manga focused on topics thought to interest the archetypal boy, including subjects like robots, space-travel, and heroic action-adventure. Popular themes include science fiction, technology, sports, and supernatural settings. Manga with solitary costumed superheroes like Superman, Batman, and Spider-Man generally did not become as popular.


title: Manga

text: The role of girls and women in manga produced for male readers has evolved considerably over time to include those featuring single pretty girls ("bishōjo") such as Belldandy from "Oh My Goddess!", stories where such girls and women surround the hero, as in "" and "Hanaukyo Maid Team", or groups of heavily armed female warriors ("sentō bishōjo")


title: Manga

text: With the relaxation of censorship in Japan in the 1990s, an assortment of explicit sexual material appeared in manga intended for male readers, and correspondingly continued into the English translations. In 2010, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government considered a bill to restrict minors' access to such content.


title: Manga

text: The "gekiga" style of storytelling—thematically somber, adult-oriented, and sometimes deeply violent—focuses on the day-in, day-out grim realities of life, often drawn in a gritty and unvarnished fashion. "Gekiga" such as Sampei Shirato's 1959–1962 "Chronicles of a Ninja's Military Accomplishments" ("Ninja Bugeichō") arose in the late 1950s and 1960s partly from left-wing student and working-class political activism, and partly from the aesthetic dissatisfaction of young manga artists like Yoshihiro Tatsumi with existing manga.


title: Manga

text: In Japan, manga constituted an annual 40.6 billion yen (approximately US$395 million) publication-industry by 2007. In 2006 sales of manga books made up for about 27% of total book-sales, and sale of manga magazines, for 20% of total magazine-sales. The manga industry has expanded worldwide, where distribution companies license and reprint manga into their native languages.


title: Manga

text: Marketeers primarily classify manga by the age and gender of the target readership. In particular, books and magazines sold to boys ("shōnen") and girls ("shōjo") have distinctive cover-art, and most bookstores place them on different shelves. Due to cross-readership, consumer response is not limited by demographics. For example, male readers may subscribe to a series intended for female readers, and so on. Japan has manga cafés, or "manga kissa" ("kissa" is an abbreviation of "kissaten"). At a "manga kissa", people drink coffee, read manga and sometimes stay overnight.


title: Manga

text: The Kyoto International Manga Museum maintains a very large website listing manga published in Japanese.


title: Manga

text: usually have many series running concurrently with approximately 20–40 pages allocated to each series per issue. Other magazines such as the anime fandom magazine "Newtype" featured single chapters within their monthly periodicals. Other magazines like "Nakayoshi" feature many stories written by many different artists; these magazines, or "anthology magazines", as they are also known (colloquially "phone books"), are usually printed on low-quality newsprint and can be anywhere from 200 to more than 850 pages thick. Manga magazines also contain one-shot comics and various four-panel "yonkoma" (equivalent to comic strips). Manga series can run for many years if they are successful. Popular shonen magazines include "Weekly Shōnen Jump", "Weekly Shōnen Magazine" and "Weekly Shōnen Sunday" - Popular shoujo manga include "Ciao", "Nakayoshi" and "Ribon". Manga artists sometimes start out with a few "one-shot" manga projects just to try to get their name out. If these are successful and receive good reviews, they are continued. Magazines often have a short life.


title: Manga

text: After a series has run for a while, publishers often collect the chapters and print them in dedicated book-sized volumes, called "tankōbon". These can be hardcover, or more usually softcover books, and are the equivalent of U.S. trade paperbacks or graphic novels. These volumes often use higher-quality paper, and are useful to those who want to "catch up" with a series so they can follow it in the magazines or if they find the cost of the weeklies or monthlies to be prohibitive. "Deluxe" versions have also been printed as readers have gotten older and the need for something special grew. Old manga have also been reprinted using somewhat lesser quality paper and sold for 100 yen (about $1 U.S. dollar) each to compete with the used book market.


title: Manga

text: Kanagaki Robun and Kawanabe Kyōsai created the first manga magazine in 1874: "Eshinbun Nipponchi". The magazine was heavily influenced by "Japan Punch", founded in 1862 by Charles Wirgman, a British cartoonist. "Eshinbun Nipponchi" had a very simple style of drawings and did not become popular with many people. "Eshinbun Nipponchi" ended after three issues. The magazine "Kisho Shimbun" in 1875 was inspired by "Eshinbun Nipponchi", which was followed by "Marumaru Chinbun" in 1877, and then "Garakuta Chinpo" in 1879. "Shōnen Sekai" was the first "shōnen" magazine created in 1895 by Iwaya Sazanami, a famous writer of Japanese children's literature back then. "Shōnen Sekai" had a strong focus on the First Sino-Japanese War.


title: Manga

text: In 1905 the manga-magazine publishing boom started with the Russo-Japanese War, "Tokyo Pakku" was created and became a huge hit. After "Tokyo Pakku" in 1905, a female version of "Shōnen Sekai" was created and named "Shōjo Sekai", considered the first "shōjo" magazine. "Shōnen Pakku" was made and is considered the first children's manga magazine. The children's demographic was in an early stage of development in the Meiji period. "Shōnen Pakku" was influenced from foreign children's magazines such as "Puck" which an employee of Jitsugyō no Nihon (publisher of the magazine) saw and decided to emulate. In 1924, "Kodomo Pakku" was launched as another children's manga magazine after "Shōnen Pakku". During the boom, "Poten" (derived from the French "potin") was published in 1908. All the pages were in full color with influences from "Tokyo Pakku" and "Osaka Puck". It is unknown if there were any more issues besides the first one. "Kodomo Pakku" was launched May 1924 by Tokyosha and featured high-quality art by many members of the manga artistry like Takei Takeo, Takehisa Yumeji and Aso Yutaka. Some of the manga featured speech balloons, where other manga from the previous eras did not use speech balloons and were silent.


title: Manga

text: Published from May 1935 to January 1941, "Manga no Kuni" coincided with the period of the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945). "Manga no Kuni" featured information on becoming a mangaka and on other comics industries around the world. "Manga no Kuni" handed its title to "Sashie Manga Kenkyū" in August 1940.


title: Manga

text: "Dōjinshi", produced by small publishers outside of the mainstream commercial market, resemble in their publishing small-press independently published comic books in the United States. Comiket, the largest comic book convention in the world with around 500,000 visitors gathering over three days, is devoted to "dōjinshi". While they most often contain original stories, many are parodies of or include characters from popular manga and anime series. Some "dōjinshi" continue with a series' story or write an entirely new one using its characters, much like fan fiction. In 2007, "dōjinshi" sales amounted to 27.73 billion yen (US$245 million). In 2006 they represented about a tenth of manga books and magazines sales.


title: Manga

text: Thanks to the advent of the internet, there have been new ways for aspiring mangaka to upload and sell their manga online. Before, there were two main ways in which a mangaka's work could be published: taking their manga drawn on paper to a publisher themselves, or submitting their work to competitions run by magazines.


title: Manga

text: In recent years, there has been a rise in manga released digitally. Web manga, as it is known in Japan, has seen an increase thanks in part to image hosting websites where anyone can upload pages from their works for free. Although released digitally, almost all web manga sticks to the conventional black-and-white format despite some never getting physical publication. Pixiv is the most popular site where amateur and professional work gets published on the site. It has grown to be the most visited site for artwork in Japan. Twitter has also become a popular place for web manga with many artists releasing pages weekly on their accounts in the hope of their work getting picked up or published professionally. One of the best examples of an amateur work becoming professional is "One-Punch Man" which was released online and later received a professional remake released digitally and an anime adaptation soon thereafter.


title: Manga

text: Many of the big print publishers have also released digital only magazines and websites where web manga get published alongside their serialized magazines. Shogakukan for instance has two websites, Sunday Webry and Ura Sunday, that release weekly chapters for web manga and even offer contests for mangaka to submit their work. Both Sunday Webry and Ura Sunday have become one of the top web manga sites in Japan. Some have even released apps that teach how to draw professional manga and learn how to create them. "Weekly Shōnen Jump" released "Jump Paint", an app that guides users on how to make their own manga from making storyboards to digitally inking lines. It also offers more than 120 types of pen tips and more than 1,000 screentones for artists to practice. Kodansha has also used the popularity of web manga to launch more series and also offer better distribution of their officially translated works under Kodansha Comics thanks in part to the titles being released digitally first before being published physically.


title: Manga

text: The rise web manga has also been credited to smartphones and computers as more and more readers read manga on their phones rather than from a print publication. While paper manga has seen a decrease over time, digital manga have been growing in sales each year. The Research Institute for Publications reports that sales of digital manga books excluding magazines jumped 27.1 percent to ¥146 billion in 2016 from the year before while sales of paper manga saw a record year-on-year decline of 7.4 percent to ¥194.7 billion. They have also said that if the digital and paper keep the same growth and drop rates, web manga would exceed their paper counterparts. In 2020 manga sales topped the ¥600 billion mark for the first time in history, beating the 1995 peak due to a fast growth of the digital manga market which rose by ¥82.7 billion from a previous year, surpassing print manga sales which have also increased.


title: Manga

text: While webtoons have caught on in popularity as a new medium for comics in Asia, Japan has been slow to adopt webtoons as the traditional format and print publication still dominate the way manga is created and consumed(although this is beginning to change). Despite this, one of the biggest webtoon publishers in the world, Comico, has had success in the traditional Japanese manga market. Comico was launched by NHN Japan, the Japanese subsidiary of Korean company, NHN Entertainment. As of now, there are only two webtoon publishers that publish Japanese webtoons: Comico and Naver Webtoon (under the name XOY in Japan). Kakao has also had success by offering licensed manga and translated Korean webtoons with their service Piccoma. All three companies credit their success to the webtoon pay model where users can purchase each chapter individually instead of having to buy the whole book while also offering some chapters for free for a period of time allowing anyone to read a whole series for free if they wait long enough. The added benefit of having all of their titles in color and some with special animations and effects have also helped them succeed. Some popular Japanese webtoons have also gotten anime adaptations and print releases, the most notable being "ReLIFE" and "Recovery of an MMO Junkie".


title: Manga

text: By 2007, the influence of manga on international comics had grown considerably over the past two decades. "Influence" is used here to refer to effects on the comics markets outside Japan and to aesthetic effects on comics artists internationally.


title: Manga

text: Traditionally, manga stories flow from top to bottom and from right to left. Some publishers of translated manga keep to this original format. Other publishers mirror the pages horizontally before printing the translation, changing the reading direction to a more "Western" left to right, so as not to confuse foreign readers or traditional comics-consumers. This practice is known as "flipping". For the most part, criticism suggests that flipping goes against the original intentions of the creator (for example, if a person wears a shirt that reads "MAY" on it, and gets flipped, then the word is altered to "YAM"), who may be ignorant of how awkward it is to read comics when the eyes must flow through the pages and text in opposite directions, resulting in an experience that's quite distinct from reading something that flows homogeneously. If the translation is not adapted to the flipped artwork carefully enough it is also possible for the text to go against the picture, such as a person referring to something on their left in the text while pointing to their right in the graphic. Characters shown writing with their right hands, the majority of them, would become left-handed when a series is flipped. Flipping may also cause oddities with familiar asymmetrical objects or layouts, such as a car being depicted with the gas pedal on the left and the brake on the right, or a shirt with the buttons on the wrong side, however these issues are minor when compared to the unnatural reading flow, and some of them could be solved with an adaptation work that goes beyond just translation and blind flipping.


title: Manga

text: Manga has highly influenced the art styles of manhwa and manhua. Manga in Indonesia is published by Elex Media Komputindo, Level Comic, M&C and Gramedia. Manga has influenced Indonesia's original comic industry. Manga in the Philippines were imported from the US and were sold only in specialty stores and in limited copies. The first manga in Filipino language is Doraemon which was published by J-Line Comics and was then followed by Case Closed. In 2015, Boy's Love manga became popular through the introduction of BL manga by printing company BLACKink. Among the first BL titles to be printed were Poster Boy, Tagila, and Sprinters, all were written in Filipino. BL manga have become bestsellers in the top three bookstore companies in the Philippines since their introduction in 2015. During the same year, Boy's Love manga have become a popular mainstream with Thai consumers, leading to television series adapted from BL manga stories since 2016.


title: Manga

text: Manga has influenced European cartooning in a way that is somewhat different from in the U.S. Broadcast anime in France and Italy opened the European market to manga during the 1970s. French art has borrowed from Japan since the 19th century (Japonism) and has its own highly developed tradition of bande dessinée cartooning. In France, beginning in the mid-1990s, manga has proven very popular to a wide readership, accounting for about one-third of comics sales in France since 2004. By mid-2021, 75 percent of the €300 value of accounts given to French 18 year-olds was spent on manga. According to the Japan External Trade Organization, sales of manga reached $212.6 million within France and Germany alone in 2006. France represents about 50% of the European market and is the second worldwide market, behind Japan. In 2013, there were 41 publishers of manga in France and, together with other Asian comics, manga represented around 40% of new comics releases in the country, surpassing Franco-Belgian comics for the first time. European publishers marketing manga translated into French include Asuka, Casterman, Glénat, Kana, and Pika Édition, among others. European publishers also translate manga into Dutch, German, Italian, and other languages. In 2007, about 70% of all comics sold in Germany were manga.


title: Manga

text: Manga publishers based in the United Kingdom include Gollancz and Titan Books. Manga publishers from the United States have a strong marketing presence in the United Kingdom: for example, the Tanoshimi line from Random House. In 2019 The British Museum held a mass exhibition dedicated to manga.


title: Manga

text: Manga made their way only gradually into U.S. markets, first in association with anime and then independently. Some U.S. fans became aware of manga in the 1970s and early 1980s. However, anime was initially more accessible than manga to U.S. fans, many of whom were college-age young people who found it easier to obtain, subtitle, and exhibit video tapes of anime than translate, reproduce, and distribute "tankōbon"-style manga books. One of the first manga translated into English and marketed in the U.S. was Keiji Nakazawa's "Barefoot Gen", an autobiographical story of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima issued by Leonard Rifas and Educomics (1980–1982). More manga were translated between the mid-1980s and 1990s, including "Golgo 13" in 1986, "Lone Wolf and Cub" from First Comics in 1987, and "Kamui", "Area 88", and "Mai the Psychic Girl", also in 1987 and all from Viz Media-Eclipse Comics. Others soon followed, including "Akira" from Marvel Comics' Epic Comics imprint, "Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind" from Viz Media, and "Appleseed" from Eclipse Comics in 1988, and later "Iczer-1" (Antarctic Press, 1994) and Ippongi Bang's "F-111 Bandit" (Antarctic Press, 1995).


title: Manga

text: In the 1980s to the mid-1990s, Japanese animation, like "Akira", "Dragon Ball", "Neon Genesis Evangelion", and "Pokémon", made a bigger impact on the fan experience and in the market than manga. Matters changed when translator-entrepreneur Toren Smith founded Studio Proteus in 1986. Smith and Studio Proteus acted as an agent and translator of many Japanese manga, including Masamune Shirow's "Appleseed" and Kōsuke Fujishima's "Oh My Goddess!", for Dark Horse and Eros Comix, eliminating the need for these publishers to seek their own contacts in Japan.


title: Manga

text: Simultaneously, the Japanese publisher Shogakukan opened a U.S. market initiative with their U.S. subsidiary Viz, enabling Viz to draw directly on Shogakukan's catalogue and translation skills.


title: Manga

text: Japanese publishers began pursuing a U.S. market in the mid-1990s due to a stagnation in the domestic market for manga. The U.S. manga market took an upturn with mid-1990s anime and manga versions of Masamune Shirow's "Ghost in the Shell" (translated by Frederik L. Schodt and Toren Smith) becoming very popular among fans. An extremely successful manga and anime translated and dubbed in English in the mid-1990s was "Sailor Moon". By 1995–1998, the "Sailor Moon" manga had been exported to over 23 countries, including China, Brazil, Mexico, Australia, North America and most of Europe. In 1997, Mixx Entertainment began publishing "Sailor Moon", along with CLAMP's "Magic Knight Rayearth", Hitoshi Iwaaki's "Parasyte" and Tsutomu Takahashi's "Ice Blade" in the monthly manga magazine "MixxZine". Mixx Entertainment, later renamed Tokyopop, also published manga in trade paperbacks and, like Viz, began aggressive marketing of manga to both young male and young female demographics.


title: Manga

text: During this period, Dark Horse Manga was a major publisher of translated manga. In addition to "Oh My Goddess!", the company published "Akira", "Astro Boy", "Berserk", "Blade of the Immortal", "Ghost in the Shell", "Lone Wolf and Cub", Yasuhiro Nightow's "Trigun" and "Blood Blockade Battlefront", "Gantz", Kouta Hirano's "Hellsing" and "Drifters", "Blood+", "Multiple Personality Detective Psycho", "FLCL", "Mob Psycho 100", and "Oreimo". The company received 13 Eisner Award nominations for its manga titles, and three of the four manga creators admitted to The Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame — Osamu Tezuka, Kazuo Koike, and Goseki Kojima — were published in Dark Horse translations.


title: Manga

text: In the following years, manga became increasingly popular, and new publishers entered the field while the established publishers greatly expanded their catalogues. The "Pokémon" manga "Electric Tale of Pikachu" issue #1 sold over 1million copies in the United States, making it the best-selling single comic book in the United States since 1993. By 2008, the U.S. and Canadian manga market generated $175 million in annual sales. Simultaneously, mainstream U.S. media began to discuss manga, with articles in "The New York Times", "Time" magazine, "The Wall Street Journal", and "Wired" magazine. As of 2017, manga distributor Viz Media is the largest publisher of graphic novels and comic books in the United States, with a 23% share of the market. BookScan sales show that manga is one of the fastest-growing areas of the comic book and narrative fiction markets. From January 2019 to May 2019, the manga market grew 16%, compared to the overall comic book market's 5% growth. The NPD Group noted that, compared to other comic book readers, manga readers are younger (76% under 30) and more diverse, including a higher female readership (16% higher than other comic books).


title: Manga

text: As of January 2020 manga is the second largest category in the US comic book and graphic novel market, accounting for 27% of the entire market share. During the COVID-19 pandemic some stores of the American bookseller Barnes & Noble saw up to a 500% increase in sales from graphic novel and manga sales due to the younger generations showing a high interest in the medium. Sales of print manga titles in the U.S. increased by 3.6 million units in the first quarter of 2021 compared to the same period in 2020. In 2021 24.4 million units of manga were sold in the United States. This is an increase of about 15 million(160%) more sales than in 2020.


title: Manga

text: A number of artists in the United States have drawn comics and cartoons influenced by manga. As an early example, Vernon Grant drew manga-influenced comics while living in Japan in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Others include Frank Miller's mid-1980s "Ronin", Adam Warren and Toren Smith's 1988 "The Dirty Pair", Ben Dunn's 1987 "Ninja High School" and "Manga Shi 2000" from Crusade Comics (1997).


title: Manga

text: By the 21st century several U.S. manga publishers had begun to produce work by U.S. artists under the broad marketing-label of manga. In 2002 I.C. Entertainment, formerly Studio Ironcat and now out of business, launched a series of manga by U.S. artists called "Amerimanga". In 2004 eigoMANGA launched the "Rumble Pak" and "Sakura Pakk" anthology series. Seven Seas Entertainment followed suit with "World Manga". Simultaneously, TokyoPop introduced original English-language manga (OEL manga) later renamed "Global Manga".


title: Manga

text: Francophone artists have also developed their own versions of manga ("manfra"), like Frédéric Boilet's "la nouvelle manga". Boilet has worked in France and in Japan, sometimes collaborating with Japanese artists.


title: Manga

text: The Japanese manga industry grants a large number of awards, mostly sponsored by publishers, with the winning prize usually including publication of the winning stories in magazines released by the sponsoring publisher. Examples of these awards include:


title: Manga

text: The Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs has awarded the International Manga Award annually since May 2007.


title: Manga

text: Kyoto Seika University in Japan has offered a highly competitive course in manga since 2000. Then, several established universities and vocational schools (専門学校: "Semmon gakkou") established a .


title: Manga

text: Shuho Sato, who wrote "Umizaru" and "Say Hello to Black Jack", has created some controversy on Twitter. Sato says, "Manga school is meaningless because those schools have very low success rates. Then, I could teach novices required skills on the job in three months. Meanwhile, those school students spend several million yen, and four years, yet they are good for nothing." and that, "For instance, Keiko Takemiya, the then professor of Seika Univ., remarked in the Government Council that 'A complete novice will be able to understand where is "Tachikiri" (i.e., margin section) during four years.' On the other hand, I would imagine that, It takes about thirty minutes to completely understand that at work."


title: Harold Ramis

text: Harold Allen Ramis (; November 21, 1944 – February 24, 2014) was an American actor, comedian, director and writer. His best-known film acting roles were as Egon Spengler in "Ghostbusters" (1984) and "Ghostbusters II" (1989), and as Russell Ziskey in "Stripes" (1981); he also co-wrote those films. As a director, his films include the comedies "Caddyshack" (1980), "National Lampoon's Vacation" (1983), "Groundhog Day" (1993), "Analyze This" (1999) and "Analyze That" (2002). Ramis was the original head writer of the television series "SCTV", on which he also performed, as well as a co-writer of "Groundhog Day" and "National Lampoon's Animal House" (1978). The final film that he wrote, produced, directed, and acted in was "Year One" (2009).


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis's films influenced subsequent generations of comedians, comedy writers and actors. Filmmakers and actors including Jay Roach, Jake Kasdan, Adam Sandler, Judd Apatow, and Peter and Bobby Farrelly have cited his films as among their favorites. Along with Danny Rubin, he won the BAFTA Award for Best Original Screenplay for "Groundhog Day".


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis was born on November 21, 1944, in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Ruth (née Cokee) (1919–2001) and Nathan Ramis (1915–2009), who owned the Ace Food & Liquor Mart on the city's far North Side. Ramis had a Jewish upbringing. In his adult life, he did not practice any religion. He graduated from Stephen K. Hayt Elementary School in June 1958 and Nicholas Senn High School in 1962, both Chicago public schools, and in 1966 from Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, where he was a member of the Alpha Xi chapter of Zeta Beta Tau fraternity.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Afterward, Ramis worked in a mental institution in St. Louis for seven months. He later said of his time working there that it:


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis began writing parodic plays in college, saying years later, "In my heart, I felt I was a combination of Groucho and Harpo Marx, of Groucho using his wit as a weapon against the upper classes, and of Harpo's antic charm and the fact that he was oddly sexy—he grabs women, pulls their skirts off, and gets away with it." He avoided the Vietnam War military draft by taking methamphetamine to fail his draft physical.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Following his work in St. Louis, Ramis returned to Chicago, where by 1968, he was a substitute teacher at schools serving the inner-city Robert Taylor Homes. He also became associated with the guerrilla television collective TVTV, headed by his college friend Michael Shamberg, and wrote freelance for the "Chicago Daily News". "Michael Shamberg, right out of college, had started freelancing for newspapers and got on as a stringer for a local paper, and I thought, 'Well, if Michael can do that, I can do that.' I wrote a spec piece and submitted it to the "Chicago Daily News," the Arts & Leisure section, and they started giving me assignments [for] entertainment features." Additionally, Ramis had begun studying and performing with Chicago's Second City improvisational comedy troupe.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis's newspaper writing led to him becoming joke editor at "Playboy" magazine. "I called…just cold and said I had written several pieces freelance and did they have any openings. And they happened to have their entry-level job, party jokes editor, open. He liked my stuff and he gave me a stack of jokes that readers had sent in and asked me to rewrite them. I had been in Second City in the workshops already and Michael Shamberg and I had written comedy shows in college." Ramis was eventually promoted to associate editor.


title: Harold Ramis

text: After leaving Second City for a time and returning in 1972, having been replaced in the main cast by John Belushi, Ramis worked his way back as Belushi's deadpan foil. In 1974, Belushi brought Ramis and other Second City performers, including Ramis's frequent future collaborator Bill Murray, to New York City to work on "The National Lampoon Radio Hour".


title: Harold Ramis

text: During this time, Ramis, Belushi, Murray, Joe Flaherty, Christopher Guest, and Gilda Radner starred in the revue "The National Lampoon Show", the successor to "National Lampoon's Lemmings". Later, Ramis became a performer on, and head writer of, the Canadian sketch-comedy television series "SCTV" during its first three years (1976–1979). At this juncture, SCTV was seen mainly in Canada, and also via syndication in scattered markets in the US. He was soon offered work as a writer at "Saturday Night Live" but chose to continue with "SCTV". Characterizations by Ramis on "SCTV" include weaselly, corrupt and constantly sweating "Dialing for Dollars" host/SCTV station manager Maurice "Moe" Green, outwardly amiable (but thoroughly fascist) cop Officer Friendly, exercise guru Swami Bananananda (whose real name was Dennis Peterson), stern board chairman Allan "Crazy Legs" Hirschman and home dentist Mort Finkel. His celebrity impressions on "SCTV" included Kenneth Clark and Leonard Nimoy.


title: Harold Ramis

text: In 1984, Ramis executive produced a music/comedy/variety television show called "The Top". The producer was Paul Flaherty and the director was David Jove. Ramis got involved after the mysterious death of his friend Peter Ivers, who had hosted Jove's underground show "New Wave Theatre". He called Jove and offered to help. Flattery and Jove pitched him the idea for "The Top", and Ramis was instrumental in getting it on the air.


title: Harold Ramis

text: The show was a mixture of live music, videos, and humor. Performers on the show included Cyndi Lauper, who performed "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" and "True Colors"; the Hollies, who performed "Stop in the Name of Love"; and the Romantics, who performed their two hits at the time, "Talking in Your Sleep" and "What I Like About You."


title: Harold Ramis

text: Guest stars included Rodney Dangerfield, Chevy Chase, and Dan Aykroyd. Ramis got Bill Murray to host but, because "Ghostbusters" filming ran late, he did not make it to the taping. Chase came out dressed as a "punk" of the time and somehow got into a physical altercation with an audience member (also a punk) during the opening monologue. He immediately left the taping. Flattery and Jove carried on with the show.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis then got Andy Kaufman to fill in for Chase and recorded the host segments at a separate, later, session; it would be Kaufman's final professional appearance.


title: Harold Ramis

text: "The Top" aired on Friday, January 27, 1984, at 7 p.m. It scored a 7.7% rating and a 14% share. This represented a 28% rating increase and a 27% share increase over KTLA's regularly scheduled "Happy Days"/"Laverne and Shirley".


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis left "SCTV" to pursue a film career and wrote a script with "National Lampoon" magazine's Douglas Kenney, which eventually became "National Lampoon's Animal House". They were later joined by a third collaborator, Chris Miller. The 1978 film followed the struggle between a rowdy college fraternity house and the college dean. The film's humor was raunchy for its time. "Animal House" "broke all box-office records for comedies" and earned $141 million.


title: Harold Ramis

text: He also had a voice part as Zeke in the "So Beautiful & So Dangerous" segment of "Heavy Metal" in 1981.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis next co-wrote the comedy "Meatballs", starring Bill Murray. The movie was a commercial success and became the first of six film collaborations between Murray and Ramis. His third film and his directorial debut was "Caddyshack", which he wrote with Kenney and Brian Doyle-Murray. It starred Chevy Chase, Rodney Dangerfield, Ted Knight, and Bill Murray. Like Ramis's previous two films, "Caddyshack" was a commercial success.


title: Harold Ramis

text: In 1982, Ramis was attached to direct the film adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning book "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole. The film was to star John Belushi and Richard Pryor, but the project was aborted. In 1984, Ramis collaborated with Dan Aykroyd on the screenplay for "Ghostbusters", which became one of the biggest comedy hits of all time, in which he also starred as Dr. Egon Spengler. He reprised the role for the 1989 sequel, "Ghostbusters II" (which he also co-wrote with Aykroyd). His later film "Groundhog Day" has been called his "masterpiece."


title: Harold Ramis

text: His films have been noted for attacking "the smugness of institutional life…with an impish good [will] that is unmistakably American." They are also noted for "Ramis's signature tongue-in-cheek pep talks." Sloppiness and improv were also important aspects of his work. Ramis frequently depicted the qualities of "anger, curiosity, laziness, and woolly idealism" in "a hyper-articulate voice."


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis also occasionally acted in supporting roles in acclaimed films that he did not write or direct, such as James L. Brooks's Academy Award-winning "As Good as It Gets" (1997) and Judd Apatow's hit comedy "Knocked Up" (2007).


title: Harold Ramis

text: In 2004, Ramis turned down the opportunity to direct the Bernie Mac-Ashton Kutcher film "Guess Who", then under the working title "The Dinner Party," because he considered it poorly written. That same year, he began filming the low-budget "The Ice Harvest", "his first attempt to make a comic film noir." Ramis spent six weeks trying to get the film greenlit because he had difficulty reaching an agreement about stars John Cusack's and Billy Bob Thornton's salaries. The film received mixed reviews. In 2004, Ramis's typical directing fee was $5 million.


title: Harold Ramis

text: In an interview in the documentary "American Storytellers", Ramis said he hoped to make a film about Emma Goldman (even pitching Disney with the idea of having Bette Midler star) but that none of the film studios were interested and that it would have been difficult to raise the funding.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis said in 2009 that he planned to make a third "Ghostbusters" film for release either in mid-2011 or for Christmas 2012. A reboot to the franchise, also called "Ghostbusters", was eventually made and released in 2016, directed and co-written by Paul Feig. In this film, a bronze bust of Ramis can be seen when Erin Gilbert leaves her office at Columbia University. Later, the second sequel to the original film, "", was released in 2021 and posthumously dedicated to him.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis was married twice and had four children. On July 2, 1967, he married San Francisco artist Anne Plotkin, with whom he had a daughter, Violet Ramis Stiel. Actor and "Ghostbusters" co-star Bill Murray is Violet's godfather. Ramis and Plotkin separated in 1984 and later divorced.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis' daughter Mollie Israel (known professionally as Mollie Heckerling) was born in 1985 to he and director Amy Heckerling, while Heckerling was married to actor-director Neal Israel.


title: Harold Ramis

text: In 1989, Ramis married Erica Mann, daughter of director Daniel Mann and actress Mary Kathleen Williams. Together they had two sons, Julian Arthur and Daniel Hayes in 1990 and 1994.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Although Ramis maintained humanist beliefs, Erica's Buddhist upbringing greatly influenced his philosophies for the rest of his life, and he became friends with the Dalai Lama.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis was a Chicago Cubs fan and attended games every year to conduct the seventh-inning stretch at Wrigley Field. His pastimes included fencing, ritual drumming, acoustic guitar, and making hats from felted fleece; additionally, he taught himself to ski by watching skiers on television.


title: Harold Ramis

text: In May 2010, Ramis contracted an infection that resulted in complications from autoimmune inflammatory vasculitis and lost the ability to walk. After relearning to walk he suffered a relapse of the disease in late 2011.


title: Harold Ramis

text: He died of complications of the disease on February 24, 2014, at his home on Chicago's North Shore, at age 69. A private funeral was held for him two days later with family, friends, and several collaborators in attendance, including Dan Aykroyd, Chevy Chase, Eugene Levy, Dave Thomas, David Pasquesi, Andrew Alexander, and the widows of John Belushi and Bernard Sahlins. He is buried at Shalom Memorial Park in Arlington Heights.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Upon Ramis's death, then-President Barack Obama released a statement, saying, "When we watched his movies—from "Animal House" and "Caddyshack" to "Ghostbusters" and "Groundhog Day"—we didn't just laugh until it hurt. We questioned authority. We identified with the outsider. We rooted for the underdog. And through it all, we never lost our faith in happy endings." He ended his statement by saying he hoped Ramis "received total consciousness," in reference to a line from "Caddyshack".


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis and longtime collaborator Bill Murray had a falling out during the filming of "Groundhog Day", which Ramis attributed to problems that Murray had in his own life at the time. They did not speak for more than 20 years. Shortly before Ramis's death, Murray, encouraged by his brother Brian Doyle-Murray, visited him to make amends with a box of donuts and a police escort, according to Ramis's daughter Violet. At that point, Ramis had lost most of his ability to speak, so Murray did most of the talking over several hours. Murray gave a tribute to Ramis at the 86th Academy Awards.


title: Harold Ramis

text: Stephen Colbert paid tribute to Ramis on an episode of his show "The Colbert Report". Colbert said that "as a young, bookish man with glasses looking for a role model, I might have picked Harold Ramis." He ended the show by thanking him.


title: Harold Ramis

text: In 2004, Ramis was inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame. In 2005, he received the Austin Film Festival's Distinguished Screenwriter Award. In 2010, he received a lifetime achievement award from the Chicago Improv Festival. In 2015, the Writers Guild of America posthumously honored him with their lifetime achievement award, the Laurel Award for Screenwriting Achievement.


title: Harold Ramis

text: In 2016, two years after his death, The Second City founded the Harold Ramis Film School, the first film school to focus solely on film comedy, in his honor.


title: Harold Ramis

text: The 2016 film "Ghostbusters", a reboot of the series Ramis co-created and starred in, was posthumously dedicated to him. A bust of Ramis appears in the film. In the 2021 movie "", the age-progressed image of Ramis appears as the ghost of Egon Spengler; a dedication before the end credits also reads "for Harold."


title: Harold Ramis

text: Ramis frequently collaborated with director Ivan Reitman. He co-wrote "National Lampoon's Animal House", which Reitman produced, then co-wrote the Reitman comedy "Meatballs"; he co-wrote and appeared in the Reitman films "Stripes", "Ghostbusters", and "Ghostbusters II".


title: Terry Crews

text: Terry Alan Crews (born July 30, 1968) is an American actor, television host, and former American footballer. He played Julius Rock in the UPN/CW sitcom "Everybody Hates Chris", which aired from 2005 to 2009, and portrayed Terry Jeffords in the Fox and NBC sitcom "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" (2013–2021). Crews starred in the BET reality series "The Family Crews" (2010–2011), and hosted the U.S. version of the game show "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire" from 2014 to 2015. He has appeared in films, including "Friday After Next" (2002), "White Chicks" (2004), "Idiocracy" (2006), "Blended" (2014), the "Expendables" series (2010–2014), and "Rumble" (2021). Crews began hosting "America's Got Talent" in 2019, following his involvement in the same role for the program's spin-off series "".


title: Terry Crews

text: Crews played as a defensive end and linebacker in the National Football League (NFL) for the Los Angeles Rams, San Diego Chargers, and Washington Redskins, as well as in the World League of American Football (WLAF) for the Rhein Fire and college football at Western Michigan University.


title: Terry Crews

text: A public advocate for women's rights and activist against sexism, Crews has shared stories of the abuse his family endured at the hands of his violent father, and was also included among the group of people named as "Time" Person of the Year in 2017 for going public with stories of sexual assault during the Me Too movement.


title: Terry Crews

text: Crews was born on July 30, 1968, in Flint, Michigan, the son of Patricia Ann (Simpson) and Terry Crews. The middle child of three, he grew up in a strict Christian household in Flint and was raised mainly by his mother, who was eighteen when he was born. His father was an alcoholic and abusive to his mother. Crews received a flute from his great aunt, and took lessons for eight years. He spent a summer at Interlochen Arts Academy and entered Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo on an art scholarship. After his freshman year, he tried out for the football team and earned a full athletic scholarship.


title: Terry Crews

text: Crews was drafted by the Los Angeles Rams in the 11th round of the 1991 NFL Draft. His career included stints with the Rams (six games), the Green Bay Packers (no games), the San Diego Chargers (10 games), the Washington Redskins (16 games), and the Philadelphia Eagles (no games). He also played for the Rhein Fire of the World League of American Football (later NFL Europe) during its 1995 season. Repeatedly cut from rosters, Crews often supplemented his football income by receiving portrait commissions from teammates.


title: Terry Crews

text: After retiring from the NFL in 1997, Crews moved to Los Angeles to pursue an acting career. He had a long-standing ambition to work in the film industry, but up until then had no plans to pursue acting, and simply wanting to be involved in some way. A year earlier, he co-wrote and co-produced the independent feature film "Young Boys Incorporated". A self-funded production filmed in Detroit with an anti-drug message, the film drew on his own observations, as well as those of his friends and family. Despite describing it as a "horrible" film, he credits the experience with getting him interested in the film industry.


title: Terry Crews

text: In 1999, Crews auditioned for a role as a character athlete (known as Warriors) in the syndicated game show "Battle Dome", which became his first acting part. He played T-Money for two seasons until its cancellation in 2001. The audition process and the opportunity to perform in front of an audience made him realize that he wanted to pursue acting as a career. However, he failed to land another acting job for the following two years.


title: Terry Crews

text: Appearances in commercials for products such as Old Spice, films, and music videos soon followed. His breakout role came in "Friday After Next" starring rapper-turned-actor Ice Cube, for whom Crews previously worked as on-set security. Having never taken acting classes, instead he asked himself what the audience wanted, and he believes this ultimately brought him success. He now believes acting is what he was born to do and would not wish to have any other career, despite the physically demanding nature of the work.


title: Terry Crews

text: Based on his performance in "White Chicks" (2004), Adam Sandler changed a role in "The Longest Yard" (2005) to give it to Crews, who auditioned for another role in the film. His role as Julius Rock, the father on the UPN/CW sitcom on "Everybody Hates Chris", brought Crews wider public recognition, and the series aired for four seasons from 2005 to 2009. Since then, Crews has had main roles as husband and father Nick Kingston-Persons in the TBS sitcom "Are We There Yet?", which aired for three seasons from 2010, and as NYPD Sergeant (and commencing in Season 7, Lieutenant) Terry Jeffords in the Fox/NBC ensemble sitcom "Brooklyn Nine-Nine", which premiered in 2013.


title: Terry Crews

text: Crews has appeared mainly in comedic roles, such as President Camacho in "Idiocracy", but he later found success in action roles beginning with his part as Hale Caesar in "The Expendables" series, which saw him make his first appearance in a film sequel. Although he has managed to sustain an athletic physique in his career as an actor, Crews has avoided being type-cast as a muscle-bound action hero and has attained critical success through exploiting the contrast of his elaborate character comedy with his physique, which extends to the point of even mocking the stereotype of the gym-obsessed bodybuilder. This contrast has also led to sustained work as part of various humorous Old Spice TV commercials.


title: Terry Crews

text: He has lent his voice to animations such as "American Dad!" and "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2". He found that he enjoyed the work and sought out more of it, finding satisfaction in how it carries his spirit into the animation. From 2010 to 2011, Crews starred in his own reality series on BET, "The Family Crews". It ran for two seasons. From 2014 to 2015, he hosted the syndicated game show "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire". He has also been the American host of Netflix's "Ultimate Beastmaster".


title: Terry Crews

text: For eight seasons he played Terry Jeffords on "Brooklyn Nine-Nine". In June 2020, Crews stated in an interview with "Access Daily" that four planned episodes for Season 8 had been aborted following the George Floyd protests, as the murder of George Floyd prompted the producers to reassess the direction of the season's storyline. The series was not renewed for a ninth season. In early 2021, Crews commented: "I'm sad it will end, but happy to have had the chance to be a part of something so special".


title: Terry Crews

text: Crews cites the many similarities between acting and professional football, including the structure and expectations, as helping his transition between the two careers. He credits Reginald Hubbard with mentoring him in his early career in the film business.


title: Terry Crews

text: In June 2017, he was cast in the science fiction comedy film "Sorry to Bother You". The film was released in theaters on July 6, 2018. Also in 2018, he appeared as Bedlam in the superhero film "Deadpool 2". Crews made appearances in the music videos for "Pressure" and "Algorithm" by British rock band Muse.


title: Terry Crews

text: Crews also starred in the video for Brittany Howard's 2019 song "Stay High" in which he lip-syncs the vocals.


title: Terry Crews

text: Crews's first job in the arts was as a courtroom sketch artist in Flint, Michigan. He received an art scholarship from college before an athletic scholarship. He later worked as courtroom sketch artist for WJRT. During his football career, Crews supplemented his income by creating portraits of fellow players. At times it was the primary income on which his family depended, typically bringing $5,000 for a two-month commission. His work included a series of NFL-licensed lithographs. He believes his imaginative side has transferred itself to his acting work.


title: Terry Crews

text: Crews and fashion designer Nana Boateng founded a design company called Amen & Amen. Their first collection was a set of furniture and light fixtures by the designer and artist Ini Archibong. In 2017 Crews designed a collection of furniture for Bernhardt Design which was shown at the International Contemporary Furniture Fair (ICFF) in New York.


title: Terry Crews

text: In 2021, announced that Amen & Amen had entered the film production sector as a "virtual production studio" based in Pasadena, California.


title: Terry Crews

text: In 2021 Crews and his wife Rebecca King wrote a memoir titled "Together: How Fame, Failure and Faith Transformed Our Lives." He has written several other books including "Tough: My Journey to True Power." He has also written and illustrated children's books including Terry's Crew, and with Ken Harvey, "Come Find Me," a story about the adventures of two brothers, Anthony and Marcus, who are based on Crews' sons.


title: Terry Crews

text: Crews is a devout Christian. He met Rebecca King when he was a college sophomore; she was the music minister at a local church. They married on July 29, 1989. They have four daughters and a son, Isaiah Crews, also an actor, and one grandchild.


title: Terry Crews

text: In 2014, Crews released his autobiography, "Manhood: How to Be a Better Man or Just Live with One". In the book, Crews detailed his long-standing pornography addiction, which had seriously affected his marriage and his life, but which he overcame around 2009 and 2010 after entering rehabilitation. Since then he has taken an active role in speaking out about the condition and its impact, including posting on Facebook in his Dirty Little Secret Series.


title: Terry Crews

text: Crews is very keen on personal development and his favorite book is "The Master Key System" by Charles F. Haanel: "I have read hundreds of personal development books, but this is the one that clearly showed me how to visualize, contemplate, and focus on what I truly wanted. It revealed to me that we only get what we desire most, and to apply myself with a laserlike focus upon a goal, task or project. That in order to 'have', you must 'do', and in order to 'do', you must 'be' - and this process is immediate. [...] I also reread it probably once a month to keep my vision clear".


title: Terry Crews

text: On October 10, 2017, in the wake of numerous Hollywood actresses going public with their stories of sexual harassment and assault by film producer Harvey Weinstein, Crews revealed that a male Hollywood executive groped him at a party in 2016, but he did not report the incident for fear of retaliation. It was later revealed that the "high-level executive" was Adam Venit, head of the motion picture department of the talent company William Morris Endeavor (WME).


title: Terry Crews

text: For his part in coming forward with the sexual assault allegations, Crews was named as one of the "Silence Breakers" from the Time Person of the Year award in 2017. WME reportedly concluded from an investigation that the incident was isolated. Venit was demoted and returned to work after a one-month suspension. In response, Crews stated, "Someone got a pass". Crews filed a lawsuit against Venit and WME for sexual assault. Some witnesses stated that Venit had gotten intoxicated, dismissed the groping as "horseplay", and apologized to Crews the next day. WME responded to the lawsuit, arguing that their reaction to Crews' claims was "both swift and serious". In March 2018, prosecutors decided not to file any charges against Venit. The city attorney's office announced that the statute of limitations to prosecute Venit had expired, as the alleged incident was in February 2016 and Crews did not report it until November 2017.


title: Terry Crews

text: After claiming that producer Avi Lerner attempted to silence him on the assault in order to retain his role in "The Expendables" film series, Crews vowed not to appear in any further installments of the franchise.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Pope John Paul II (; ; ; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his death in April 2005, and was later canonised as Pope Saint John Paul II.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: He was elected pope by the second papal conclave of 1978, which was called after John Paul I, who had been elected in August to succeed Pope Paul VI, died after 33 days. Cardinal Wojtyła was elected on the third day of the conclave and adopted the name of his predecessor in tribute to him. Born in Poland, John Paul II was the first non-Italian pope since Adrian VI in the 16th century and the second-longest-serving pope after Pius IX in modern history.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: John Paul II attempted to improve the Catholic Church's relations with Judaism, Islam, and the Eastern Orthodox Church. He maintained the church's previous positions on such matters as abortion, artificial contraception, the ordination of women, and a celibate clergy, and although he supported the reforms of the Second Vatican Council, he was seen as generally conservative in their interpretation. He was one of the most travelled world leaders in history, visiting 129 countries during his pontificate. As part of his special emphasis on the universal call to holiness, he beatified 1,344 and canonised 483 people, more than the combined tally of his predecessors during the preceding five centuries. By the time of his death, he had named most of the College of Cardinals, consecrated or co-consecrated many of the world's bishops, and ordained many priests. He has also been credited with helping to end Communist rule in his native Poland as well as the rest of Europe.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: John Paul II's cause for canonisation commenced one month after his death with the traditional five-year waiting period waived. On 19 December 2009, John Paul II was proclaimed venerable by his successor, Benedict XVI, and was beatified on 1 May 2011 (Divine Mercy Sunday) after the Congregation for the Causes of Saints attributed one miracle to his intercession, the healing of a French nun called Marie Simon Pierre from Parkinson's disease. A second miracle was approved on 2 July 2013, and confirmed by Pope Francis two days later. John Paul II was canonised on 27 April 2014 (again Divine Mercy Sunday), together with John XXIII. On 11 September 2014, Pope Francis added these two optional memorials to the worldwide General Roman Calendar of saints. It is traditional to celebrate saints' feast days on the anniversary of their deaths, but that of John Paul II (22 October) is celebrated on the anniversary of his papal inauguration. Posthumously, he has been referred to by some Catholics as "Pope St. John Paul the Great", although the title has no official recognition.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Karol Józef Wojtyła was born in the Polish town of Wadowice. He was the youngest of three children born to Karol Wojtyła (1879–1941), an ethnic Pole, and Emilia Kaczorowska (1884–1929), who was of distant Lithuanian heritage. Emilia, who was a schoolteacher, died from a heart attack and kidney failure in 1929 when Wojtyła was eight years old. His elder sister Olga had died before his birth, but he was close to his brother Edmund, nicknamed Mundek, who was 13 years his senior. Edmund's work as a physician eventually led to his death from scarlet fever, a loss that affected Wojtyła deeply.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Wojtyła was baptized a month after his birth, made his First Communion at the age of 9, and was confirmed at the age of 18. As a boy, Wojtyła was athletic, often playing football as goalkeeper. During his childhood, Wojtyła had contact with the large Jewish community of Wadowice. School football games were often organised between teams of Jews and Catholics, and Wojtyła often played on the Jewish side. "I remember that at least a third of my classmates at elementary school in Wadowice were Jews. At secondary school there were fewer. With some I was on very friendly terms. And what struck me about some of them was their Polish patriotism." It was around this time that the young Karol had his first serious relationship with a girl. He became close to a girl called Ginka Beer, described as "a Jewish beauty, with stupendous eyes and jet black hair, slender, a superb actress."


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In mid-1938, Wojtyła and his father left Wadowice and moved to Kraków, where he enrolled at the Jagiellonian University. While studying such topics as philology and various languages, he worked as a volunteer librarian and though required to participate in compulsory military training in the Academic Legion, he refused to fire a weapon. He performed with various theatrical groups and worked as a playwright. During this time, his talent for language blossomed, and he learned as many as 15 languages — Polish, Latin, Italian, English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, Luxembourgish, Dutch, Ukrainian, Serbo-Croatian, Czech, Slovak and Esperanto, nine of which he used extensively as pope.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In 1939, after invading Poland, the Nazi German occupation forces closed the university. Able-bodied males were required to work, so from 1940 to 1944 Wojtyła variously worked as a messenger for a restaurant, a manual labourer in a limestone quarry and for the Solvay chemical factory, in order to avoid deportation to Germany. In February 1940, he met Jan Tyranowski who introduced him to the Carmelite spirituality and the "Living Rosary" youth groups. In that same year he had two major accidents, suffering a fractured skull after being struck by a tram and sustaining injuries which left him with one shoulder higher than the other and a permanent stoop after being hit by a lorry in a quarry. His father, a former Austro-Hungarian non-commissioned officer and later officer in the Polish Army, died of a heart attack in 1941, leaving Wojtyła as the immediate family's only surviving member. "I was not at my mother's death, I was not at my brother's death, I was not at my father's death," he said, reflecting on these times of his life, nearly forty years later, "At twenty, I had already lost all the people I loved."


title: Pope John Paul II

text: After his father's death, he started thinking seriously about the priesthood. In October 1942, while the war continued, he knocked on the door of the Archbishop's residence in Kraków and asked to study for the priesthood. Soon after, he began courses in the clandestine underground seminary run by the Archbishop of Kraków, Cardinal Adam Stefan Sapieha. On 29 February 1944, Wojtyła was hit by a German truck. German Wehrmacht officers tended to him and sent him to a hospital. He spent two weeks there recovering from a severe concussion and a shoulder injury. It seemed to him that this accident and his survival was a confirmation of his vocation. On 6 August 1944, a day known as "Black Sunday", the Gestapo rounded up young men in Kraków to curtail the uprising there, similar to the recent uprising in Warsaw. Wojtyła escaped by hiding in the basement of his uncle's house at 10 Tyniecka Street, while the German troops searched above. More than eight thousand men and boys were taken that day, while Wojtyła escaped to the Archbishop's residence, where he remained until after the Germans had left.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: On the night of 17 January 1945, the Germans fled the city, and the students reclaimed the ruined seminary. Wojtyła and another seminarian volunteered for the task of clearing away piles of frozen excrement from the toilets. Wojtyła also helped a 14-year-old Jewish refugee girl named Edith Zierer, who had escaped from a Nazi labour camp in Częstochowa. Edith had collapsed on a railway platform, so Wojtyła carried her to a train and stayed with her throughout the journey to Kraków. She later credited Wojtyła with saving her life that day. B'nai B'rith and other authorities have said that Wojtyła helped protect many other Polish Jews from the Nazis. During the Nazi occupation of Poland, a Jewish family sent their son, Stanley Berger, to be hidden by a Gentile Polish family. Berger's biological Jewish parents were killed in the Holocaust, and after the war Berger's new Christian parents asked Karol Wojtyła to baptise the boy. Wojtyła refused, saying that the child should be raised in the Jewish faith of his birth parents and nation, not as a Catholic. He did everything he could to ensure that Berger leave Poland to be raised by his Jewish relatives in the United States. In April 2005, shortly after John Paul II's death, the Israeli government created a commission to honour the legacy of John Paul II. One of the honorifics proposed by a head of Italy's Jewish community, Emmanuele Pacifici was the medal of the Righteous Among the Nations. In Wojtyła's last book, "Memory and Identity", he described the 12 years of the Nazi régime as "bestiality", quoting from the Polish theologian and philosopher Konstanty Michalski.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: After finishing his studies at the seminary in Kraków, Wojtyła was ordained as a priest on All Saints' Day, 1 November 1946, by the archbishop of Kraków, cardinal Adam Stefan Sapieha. Sapieha sent Wojtyła to Rome's Pontifical International Athenaeum "Angelicum", the future Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas, to study under the French Dominican friar Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange beginning on 26 November 1946. He resided in the Belgian Pontifical College during this time, under rectorship of Maximilien de Furstenberg. Wojtyła earned a licence in July 1947, passed his doctoral exam on 14 June 1948, and successfully defended his doctoral thesis titled "Doctrina de fide apud S. Ioannem a Cruce" (The Doctrine of Faith in St. John of the Cross) in philosophy on 19 June 1948. The "Angelicum" preserves the original copy of Wojtyła's typewritten thesis. Among other courses at the "Angelicum", Wojtyła studied Hebrew with the Dutch Dominican Peter G. Duncker, author of the "Compendium grammaticae linguae hebraicae biblicae".


title: Pope John Paul II

text: According to Wojtyła's fellow student, the future Austrian cardinal Alfons Stickler, in 1947 during his sojourn at the "Angelicum", Wojtyła visited Padre Pio, who heard his confession and told him that one day he would ascend to "the highest post in the Church". Stickler added that Wojtyła believed that the prophecy was fulfilled when he became a cardinal.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Wojtyła returned to Poland in the summer of 1948 for his first pastoral assignment in the village of Niegowić, from Kraków, at the Church of the Assumption. He arrived at Niegowić at harvest time, where his first action was to kneel and kiss the ground. He repeated this gesture, which he adopted from Jean Marie Baptiste Vianney, throughout his papacy.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In March 1949, Wojtyła was transferred to the parish of Saint Florian in Kraków. He taught ethics at Jagiellonian University and subsequently at the Catholic University of Lublin. While teaching, he gathered a group of about 20 young people, who began to call themselves "Rodzinka", the "little family". They met for prayer, philosophical discussion, and to help the blind and the sick. The group eventually grew to approximately 200 participants, and their activities expanded to include annual skiing and kayaking trips.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In 1953, Wojtyła's habilitation thesis was accepted by the Faculty of Theology at the Jagiellonian University. In 1954, he earned a Doctorate in Sacred Theology, evaluating the feasibility of a Catholic ethic based on the ethical system of the phenomenologist Max Scheler with a dissertation titled "Reevaluation of the possibility of founding a Catholic ethic on the ethical system of Max Scheler" (). Scheler was a German philosopher who founded a broad philosophical movement that emphasised the study of conscious experience. However, the Communist authorities abolished the Faculty of Theology at the Jagellonian University, thereby preventing him from receiving the degree until 1957. Wojtyła developed a theological approach, called phenomenological Thomism, that combined traditional Catholic Thomism with the ideas of personalism, a philosophical approach deriving from phenomenology, which was popular among Catholic intellectuals in Kraków during Wojtyła's intellectual development. He translated Scheler's "Formalism and the Ethics of Substantive Values". In 1961, he coined "Thomistic Personalism" to describe Aquinas's philosophy.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: During this period, Wojtyła wrote a series of articles in Kraków's Catholic newspaper, "Tygodnik Powszechny" (""Universal Weekly""), dealing with contemporary church issues. He focused on creating original literary work during his first dozen years as a priest. War, life under Communism, and his pastoral responsibilities all fed his poetry and plays. Wojtyła published his work under two pseudonyms—"Andrzej Jawień" and "Stanisław Andrzej Gruda"—to distinguish his literary from his religious writings (issued under his own name), and also so that his literary works would be considered on their own merits. In 1960, Wojtyła published the influential theological book "Love and Responsibility", a defence of traditional church teachings on marriage from a new philosophical standpoint.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: While a priest in Kraków, groups of students regularly joined Wojtyła for hiking, skiing, bicycling, camping and kayaking, accompanied by prayer, outdoor Masses and theological discussions. In Stalinist-era Poland, it was not permitted for priests to travel with groups of students. Wojtyła asked his younger companions to call him "Wujek" (Polish for "Uncle") to prevent outsiders from deducing he was a priest. The nickname gained popularity among his followers. In 1958, when Wojtyła was named auxiliary bishop of Kraków, his acquaintances expressed concern that this would cause him to change. Wojtyła responded to his friends, "Wujek will remain Wujek," and he continued to live a simple life, shunning the trappings that came with his position as bishop. This beloved nickname stayed with Wojtyła for his entire life and continues to be affectionately used, particularly by the Polish people.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: On 4 July 1958, while Wojtyła was on a kayaking holiday in the lakes region of northern Poland, Pope Pius XII appointed him as an auxiliary bishop of Kraków. He was consequently summoned to Warsaw to meet the Primate of Poland, Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński, who informed him of his appointment. Wojtyła accepted the appointment as auxiliary bishop to Kraków's Archbishop Eugeniusz Baziak, and he received episcopal consecration (as titular bishop of Ombi) on 28 September 1958, with Baziak as the principal consecrator and as co-consecrators Bishop Bolesław Kominek (titular bishop of Sophene and Vågå, auxiliary of the Catholic Archdiocese of Wrocław, and Franciszek Jop, Auxiliary Bishop of Sandomierz (Titular Bishop of Daulia. Kominek was to become Cardinal Archbishop of Wrocław) and Jop was later Auxiliary Bishop of Wrocław and then Bishop of Opole). At the age of 38, Wojtyła became the youngest bishop in Poland.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In 1959, Wojtyła began an annual tradition of saying a Midnight Mass on Christmas Day in an open field at Nowa Huta, the so-called model workers' town outside Kraków that was without a church building. Baziak died in June 1962 and on 16 July, Wojtyła was selected as "Vicar Capitular" "(temporary administrator)" of the Archdiocese until an archbishop could be appointed.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: From October 1962, Wojtyła took part in the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), where he made contributions to two of its most historic and influential products, the "Decree on Religious Freedom" (in Latin, "Dignitatis humanae") and the "Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World" ("Gaudium et spes"). Wojtyła and the Polish bishops contributed a draft text to the Council for "Gaudium et spes". According to the Jesuit historian John W. O'Malley, the draft text "Gaudium et spes" that Wojtyła and the Polish delegation sent "had some influence on the version that was sent to the council fathers that summer but was not accepted as the base text". According to John F. Crosby, as pope, John Paul II used the words of "Gaudium et spes" later to introduce his own views on the nature of the human person in relation to God: man is "the only creature on earth that God has wanted for its own sake", but man "can fully discover his true self only in a sincere giving of himself".


title: Pope John Paul II

text: He also participated in the assemblies of the Synod of Bishops. On 13 January 1964, Pope Paul VI appointed him Archbishop of Kraków. On 26 June 1967, Paul VI announced Wojtyła's promotion to the College of Cardinals. Wojtyła was named cardinal priest of the titulus of San Cesareo in Palatio.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In 1967, he was instrumental in formulating the encyclical "Humanae vitae", which dealt with the same issues that forbid abortion and artificial birth control.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: According to a contemporary witness, Wojtyła was against the distribution of a letter around Kraków in 1970, stating that the Polish Episcopate was preparing for the 50th anniversary of the Polish–Soviet War.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In 1973, Wojtyła met philosopher Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka, the wife of Hendrik S. Houthakker, professor of economics at Stanford University and Harvard University, and member of President Nixon's Council of Economic Advisers Tymieniecka collaborated with Wojtyła on a number of projects including an English translation of Wojtyła's book "Osoba i czyn" ("Person and Act"). "Person and Act", one of John Paul II's foremost literary works, was initially written in Polish. Tymieniecka produced the English-language version. They corresponded over the years, and grew to be good friends. When Wojtyła visited New England in the summer of 1976, Tymieniecka put him up as a guest in her family home. Wojtyła enjoyed his holiday in Pomfret, Vermont kayaking and enjoying the outdoors, as he had done in his beloved Poland.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: During 1974–1975, Wojtyła served Pope Paul VI as consultor to the Pontifical Council for the Laity, as recording secretary for the 1974 synod on evangelism and by participating extensively in the original drafting of the 1975 apostolic exhortation, "Evangelii nuntiandi".


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In August 1978, following the death of Pope Paul VI, Wojtyła voted in the papal conclave, which elected John Paul I. John Paul I died after only 33 days as pope, triggering another conclave.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: The second conclave of 1978 started on 14 October, ten days after the funeral. It was split between two strong candidates for the papacy: Cardinal Giuseppe Siri, the conservative Archbishop of Genoa, and the liberal Archbishop of Florence, Cardinal Giovanni Benelli, a close friend of John Paul I.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Supporters of Benelli were confident that he would be elected, and in early ballots, Benelli came within nine votes of success. However, both men faced sufficient opposition for neither to be likely to prevail. Giovanni Colombo, the Archbishop of Milan, was considered as a compromise candidate among the Italian cardinal-electors, but when he started to receive votes, he announced that, if elected, he would decline to accept the papacy. Cardinal Franz König, Archbishop of Vienna, suggested Wojtyła as another compromise candidate to his fellow electors. Wojtyła won on the eighth ballot on the third day (16 October)—coincidentally the day that the American evangelical preacher Billy Graham had just concluded a 10-day pilgrimage to Poland—with, according to the Italian press, 99 votes from the 111 participating electors.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Among those cardinals who rallied behind Wojtyła were supporters of Giuseppe Siri, Stefan Wyszyński, most of the American cardinals (led by John Krol), and other moderate cardinals. He accepted his election with the words: "With obedience in faith to Christ, my Lord, and with trust in the Mother of Christ and the Church, in spite of great difficulties, I accept". The pope, in tribute to his immediate predecessor, then took the regnal name of "John Paul II", also in honor of the late Pope Paul VI, and the traditional white smoke informed the crowd gathered in St. Peter's Square that a pope had been chosen. There had been rumors that the new pope wished to be known as "Pope Stanislaus" in honor of the Polish saint of the name, but was convinced by the cardinals that it was not a Roman name. When the new pontiff appeared on the balcony, he broke tradition by addressing the gathered crowd:


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Dear brothers and sisters, we are saddened at the death of our beloved Pope John Paul I, and so the cardinals have called for a new bishop of Rome. They called him from a faraway land—far and yet always close because of our communion in faith and Christian traditions. I was afraid to accept that responsibility, yet I do so in a spirit of obedience to the Lord and total faithfulness to Mary, our most Holy Mother. I am speaking to you in your—no, our Italian language. If I make a mistake, please me ... "[deliberately mispronouncing the word 'correct']"


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Wojtyła became the 264th pope according to the chronological list of popes, the first non-Italian in 455 years. At only 58 years of age, he was the youngest pope since Pope Pius IX in 1846, who was 54. Like his predecessor, John Paul II dispensed with the traditional papal coronation and instead received ecclesiastical investiture with a simplified papal inauguration on 22 October 1978. During his inauguration, when the cardinals were to kneel before him to take their vows and kiss his ring, he stood up as the Polish prelate, Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński knelt down, stopped him from kissing the ring, and simply embraced him.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: During his pontificate, John Paul II made journeys to 129 countries, travelling more than while doing so. He consistently attracted large crowds, some among the largest ever assembled in human history, such as the Manila World Youth Day, which gathered up to four million people, the largest papal gathering ever, according to the Vatican. John Paul II's earliest official visits were to the Dominican Republic and Mexico in January 1979.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: While some of his journeys (such as to the United States and the Holy Land) were to places previously visited by Pope Paul VI, John Paul II became the first pope to visit the White House in October 1979, where he was greeted warmly by President Jimmy Carter. He was the first pope ever to visit several countries in one year, starting in 1979 with Mexico and Ireland. He was the first reigning pope to travel to the United Kingdom, in 1982, where he met Queen Elizabeth II, the Supreme Governor of the Church of England. While in Britain he also visited Canterbury Cathedral and knelt in prayer with Robert Runcie, the Archbishop of Canterbury, at the spot where Thomas Becket had been killed, as well as holding several large-scale open air masses, including one at Wembley Stadium, which was attended by some 80,000 people.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: He travelled to Haiti in 1983, where he spoke in Creole to thousands of impoverished Catholics gathered to greet him at the airport. His message, "things must change in Haiti," referring to the disparity between the wealthy and the poor, was met with thunderous applause. In 2000, he was the first modern pope to visit Egypt, where he met with the Coptic pope, Pope Shenouda III and the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Alexandria. He was the first Catholic pope to visit and pray in an Islamic mosque, in Damascus, Syria, in 2001. He visited the Umayyad Mosque, a former Christian church where John the Baptist is believed to be interred, where he made a speech calling for Muslims, Christians and Jews to live together.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: On 15 January 1995, during the X World Youth Day, he offered Mass to an estimated crowd of between five and seven million in Luneta Park, Manila, Philippines, which was considered to be the largest single gathering in Christian history. In March 2000, while visiting Jerusalem, John Paul became the first pope in history to visit and pray at the Western Wall. In September 2001, amid post-11 September concerns, he travelled to Kazakhstan, with an audience largely consisting of Muslims, and to Armenia, to participate in the celebration of 1,700 years of Armenian Christianity.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In June 1979, John Paul II travelled to Poland, where ecstatic crowds constantly surrounded him. This first papal trip to Poland uplifted the nation's spirit and sparked the formation of the Solidarity movement in 1980, which later brought freedom and human rights to his troubled homeland. Poland's Communist leaders intended to use the pope's visit to show the people that although the pope was Polish it did not alter their capacity to govern, oppress, and distribute the goods of society. They also hoped that if the pope abided by the rules they set, that the Polish people would see his example and follow them as well. If the pope's visit inspired a riot, the Communist leaders of Poland were prepared to crush the uprising and blame the suffering on the pope.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: On later trips to Poland, he gave tacit support to the Solidarity organisation. These visits reinforced this message and contributed to the collapse of East European Communism that took place between 1989/1990 with the reintroduction of democracy in Poland, and which then spread through Eastern Europe (1990–1991) and South-Eastern Europe (1990–1992).


title: Pope John Paul II

text: As an extension of his successful work with youth as a young priest, John Paul II pioneered the international World Youth Days. John Paul II presided over nine of them: Rome (1985 and 2000), Buenos Aires (1987), Santiago de Compostela (1989), Częstochowa (1991), Denver (1993), Manila (1995), Paris (1997), and Toronto (2002). Total attendance at these signature events of the pontificate was in the tens of millions.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Keenly aware of the rhythms of time and the importance of anniversaries in the Catholic Church's life, John Paul II led nine "dedicated years" during the twenty-six and a half years of his pontificate: the Holy Year of the Redemption in 1983–84, the Marian Year in 1987–88, the Year of the Family in 1993–94, the three Trinitarian years of preparation for the Great Jubilee of 2000, the Great Jubilee itself, the Year of the Rosary in 2002–3, and the Year of the Eucharist, which began on 17 October 2004, and concluded six months after the Pope's death.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: The Great Jubilee of 2000 was a call to the church to become more aware and to embrace her missionary task for the work of evangelization.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: From the beginning of my Pontificate, my thoughts had been on this Holy Year 2000 as an important appointment. I thought of its celebration as a providential opportunity during which the Church, thirty-five years after the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, would examine how far she had renewed herself, in order to be able to take up her evangelising mission with fresh enthusiasm.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: John Paul II also made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land for the Great Jubilee of 2000. During his visit to the Holy Land, John Paul II visited many sites of the Rosary, including the following locations: Bethany Beyond the Jordan (Al-Maghtas), at the Jordan River, where John the Baptist baptized Jesus; Manger Square and the Church of the Nativity in the town of Bethlehem, the location of Jesus' birth; and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, the site of Jesus' burial and resurrection.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: As pope, John Paul II wrote 14 papal encyclicals and taught about sexuality in what is referred as the "Theology of the Body". Some key elements of his strategy to "reposition the Catholic Church" were encyclicals such as "Ecclesia de Eucharistia", "Reconciliatio et paenitentia" and "Redemptoris Mater". In his "At the beginning of the new millennium" ("Novo Millennio Ineunte"), he emphasised the importance of "starting afresh from Christ": "No, we shall not be saved by a formula but by a Person." In "The Splendour of the Truth" ("Veritatis Splendor"), he emphasised the dependence of man on God and His Law ("Without the Creator, the creature disappears") and the "dependence of freedom on the truth". He warned that man "giving himself over to relativism and scepticism, goes off in search of an illusory freedom apart from truth itself". In "Fides et Ratio" ("On the Relationship between Faith and Reason") John Paul promoted a renewed interest in philosophy and an autonomous pursuit of truth in theological matters. Drawing on many different sources (such as Thomism), he described the mutually supporting relationship between faith and reason, and emphasised that theologians should focus on that relationship. John Paul II wrote extensively about workers and the social doctrine of the church, which he discussed in three encyclicals: "Laborem exercens", "Sollicitudo rei socialis", and "Centesimus annus". Through his encyclicals and many Apostolic Letters and Exhortations, John Paul II talked about the dignity and the equality of women. He argued for the importance of the family for the future of humanity. Other encyclicals include "The Gospel of Life" ("Evangelium Vitae") and "Ut Unum Sint" ("That They May Be One"). Though critics accused him of inflexibility in explicitly re-asserting Catholic moral teachings against abortion and euthanasia that have been in place for well over a thousand years, he urged a more nuanced view of capital punishment. In his second encyclical "Dives in misericordia" he stressed that divine mercy is the greatest feature of God, needed especially in modern times.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: John Paul II was considered a conservative on doctrine and issues relating to human sexual reproduction and the ordination of women.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: While he was visiting the United States in 1977, the year before becoming pope, Wojtyła said: "All human life, from the moments of conception and through all subsequent stages, is sacred."


title: Pope John Paul II

text: A series of 129 lectures given by John Paul II during his Wednesday audiences in Rome between September 1979 and November 1984 were later compiled and published as a single work titled "Theology of the Body", an extended meditation on human sexuality. He extended it to the condemnation of abortion, euthanasia and virtually all capital punishment, calling them all a part of a struggle between a "culture of life" and a "culture of death". He campaigned for world debt forgiveness and social justice. He coined the term "social mortgage", which related that all private property had a social dimension, namely, that "the goods of this are originally meant for all." In 2000, he publicly endorsed the Jubilee 2000 campaign on African debt relief fronted by Irish rock stars Bob Geldof and Bono, once famously interrupting a U2 recording session by telephoning the studio and asking to speak to Bono.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: John Paul II, who was present and very influential at the 1962–65 Second Vatican Council, affirmed the teachings of that Council and did much to implement them. Nevertheless, his critics often wished that he would embrace the so-called "progressive" agenda that some hoped would evolve as a result of the Council. In fact, the Council did not advocate "progressive" changes in these areas; for example, they still condemned abortion as an unspeakable crime. John Paul II continued to declare that contraception, abortion, and homosexual acts were gravely sinful, and, with Joseph Ratzinger (future Pope Benedict XVI), opposed liberation theology.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Following the church's exaltation of the marital act of sexual intercourse between a baptised man and woman within sacramental marriage as proper and exclusive to the sacrament of marriage, John Paul II believed that it was, in every instance, profaned by contraception, abortion, divorce followed by a 'second' marriage, and by homosexual acts. In 1994, John Paul II asserted the church's lack of authority to ordain women to the priesthood, stating that without such authority ordination is not legitimately compatible with fidelity to Christ. This was also deemed a repudiation of calls to break with the constant tradition of the church by ordaining women to the priesthood. In addition, John Paul II chose not to end the discipline of mandatory priestly celibacy, although in a small number of unusual circumstances, he did allow certain married clergymen of other Christian traditions who later became Catholic to be ordained as Catholic priests.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: John Paul II was an outspoken opponent of apartheid in South Africa. In 1985, while visiting the Netherlands, he gave an impassioned speech condemning apartheid at the International Court of Justice, proclaiming that "No system of apartheid or separate development will ever be acceptable as a model for the relations between peoples or races." In September 1988, John Paul II made a pilgrimage to ten Southern African countries, including those bordering South Africa, while demonstratively avoiding South Africa. During his visit to Zimbabwe, John Paul II called for economic sanctions against South Africa's government. After John Paul II's death, both Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu praised the pope for defending human rights and condemning economic injustice.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: John Paul II was an outspoken opponent of the death penalty, although previous popes had accepted the practice. At a papal mass in St. Louis, Missouri, in the United States he said:


title: Pope John Paul II

text: A sign of hope is the increasing recognition that the dignity of human life must never be taken away, even in the case of someone who has done great evil. Modern society has the means of protecting itself, without definitively denying criminals the chance to reform. I renew the appeal I made most recently at Christmas for a consensus to end the death penalty, which is both cruel and unnecessary.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: During that visit, John Paul II convinced the then governor of Missouri, Mel Carnahan, to reduce the death sentence of convicted murderer Darrell J. Mease to life imprisonment without parole. John Paul II's other attempts to reduce the sentence of death-row inmates were unsuccessful. In 1983, John Paul II visited Guatemala and unsuccessfully asked the country's president, Efraín Ríos Montt, to reduce the sentence for six left-wing guerrillas sentenced to death.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In 2002, John Paul II again travelled to Guatemala. At that time, Guatemala was one of only two countries in Latin America (the other being Cuba) to apply capital punishment. John Paul II asked the Guatemalan president, Alfonso Portillo, for a moratorium on executions.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: John Paul II pushed for a reference to Europe's Christian cultural roots in the draft of the European Constitution. In his 2003 apostolic exhortation "Ecclesia in Europa", John Paul II wrote that he "fully (respected) the secular nature of (European) institutions". However, he wanted the EU Constitution to enshrine religious rights, including acknowledging the rights of religious groups to organise freely, recognise the specific identity of each denomination and allow for a "structured dialogue" between each religious community and the EU, and extend across the European Union the legal status enjoyed by religious institutions in individual member states. "I wish once more to appeal to those drawing up the future European Constitutional Treaty so that it will include a reference to the religion and in particular to the Christian heritage of Europe," John Paul II said. The pope's desire for a reference to Europe's Christian identity in the Constitution was supported by non-Catholic representatives of the Church of England and Eastern Orthodox Churches from Russia, Romania, and Greece. John Paul II's demand to include a reference to Europe's Christian roots in the European Constitution was supported by some non-Christians, such as Joseph Weiler, a practising Orthodox Jew and renowned constitutional lawyer, who said that the Constitution's lack of a reference to Christianity was not a "demonstration of neutrality," but, rather, "a Jacobin attitude".


title: Pope John Paul II

text: At the same time, however, John Paul II was an enthusiastic supporter of European integration; in particular, he supported his native Poland's entry into the bloc. On 19 May 2003, three weeks before a referendum was held in Poland on EU membership, the Polish pope addressed his compatriots and urged them to vote for Poland's EU membership at St. Peter's Square in Vatican City State. While some conservative, Catholic politicians in Poland opposed EU membership, John Paul II said:


title: Pope John Paul II

text: I know that there are many in opposition to integration. I appreciate their concern about maintaining the cultural and religious identity of our nation. However, I must emphasise that Poland has always been an important part of Europe. Europe needs Poland. The Church in Europe needs the Poles' testimony of faith. Poland needs Europe.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: The Polish pope compared Poland's entry into the EU to the Union of Lublin, which was signed in 1569 and united the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania into one nation and created an elective monarchy.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: On 22 October 1996, in a speech to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences plenary session at the Vatican, John Paul II said of evolution that "this theory has been progressively accepted by researchers, following a series of discoveries in various fields of knowledge. The convergence, neither sought nor fabricated, of the results of work that was conducted independently is in itself a significant argument in favour of this theory." John Paul II's embrace of evolution was enthusiastically praised by American paleontologist and evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould, with whom he had an audience in 1984.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Although generally accepting the theory of evolution, John Paul II made one major exception—the human soul. "If the human body has its origin in living material which pre-exists it, the spiritual soul is immediately created by God."


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In 2003 John Paul II criticised the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, saying in his State of the World address "No to war! War is not always inevitable. It is always a defeat for humanity." He sent Pio Cardinal Laghi, the former Apostolic Pro-Nuncio to the United States, to talk with George W. Bush, the US president, to express opposition to the war. John Paul II said that it was up to the United Nations to solve the international conflict through diplomacy and that a unilateral aggression is a crime against peace and a violation of international law. The pope's opposition to the Iraq War led to him being a candidate to win the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize, which was ultimately awarded to Iranian attorney/judge and noted human rights advocate, Shirin Ebadi.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In 1984 and 1986, through Cardinal Ratzinger (future Pope Benedict XVI) as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, John Paul II officially condemned aspects of liberation theology, which had many followers in Latin America.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Visiting Europe, Salvadoran Archbishop Óscar Romero unsuccessfully advocated for the Vatican to condemn the right-wing military regime of El Salvador, for violations of human rights during the Salvadoran Civil War and the support of death squads. Though Romero expressed his frustration at working with clergy who cooperated with the government, John Paul II encouraged him to maintain episcopal unity as a top priority.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In his travel to Managua, Nicaragua in 1983, John Paul II harshly condemned what he dubbed the "popular Church" (i.e. "ecclesial base communities" supported by the CELAM), and the Nicaraguan clergy's tendencies to support the leftist Sandinistas, reminding the clergy of their duties of obedience to the Holy See. During that visit Ernesto Cardenal, a priest and minister in the Sandinista government, knelt to kiss his hand. John Paul withdrew it, wagged his finger in Cardenal's face, and told him, "You must straighten out your position with the church."


title: Pope John Paul II

text: John Paul II was the first pontiff to denounce Mafia violence in Southern Italy. In 1993, during a pilgrimage to Agrigento, Sicily, he appealed to the Mafiosi: "I say to those responsible: 'Convert! One day, the judgment of God will arrive!'" In 1994, John Paul II visited Catania and told victims of Mafia violence to "rise up and cloak yourself in light and justice!"


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In 1995, the Mafia bombed two historical churches in Rome. Some believed that this was the mob's vendetta against the pope for his denunciations of organised crime.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: Between 1990 and 1991, a 34-nation coalition led by the United States waged a war against Saddam Hussein's Iraq, which had invaded and annexed Kuwait. John Paul II was a staunch opponent of the Gulf War. Throughout the conflict, he appealed to the international community to stop the war, and after it was over led diplomatic initiatives to negotiate peace in the Middle East. In his 1991 encyclical Centesimus Annus, John Paul II harshly condemned the conflict:


title: Pope John Paul II

text: No, never again war, which destroys the lives of innocent people, teaches how to kill, throws into upheaval even the lives of those who do the killing and leaves behind a trail of resentment and hatred, thus making it all the more difficult to find a just solution of the very problems which provoked the war.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In April 1991, during his "Urbi et Orbi" Sunday message at St. Peter's Basilica, John Paul II called for the international community to "lend an ear" to "the long-ignored aspirations of oppressed peoples". He specifically named the Kurds, a people who were fighting a civil war against Saddam Hussein's troops in Iraq, as one such people, and referred to the war as a "darkness menacing the earth". During this time, the Vatican had expressed its frustration with the international ignoring of the pope's calls for peace in the Middle East.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In 1990 during the civil war between Tutsis and Hutus in the mostly Catholic country of Rwanda, John Paul II called for a ceasefire and condemned the persecution of the Tutsis. In 1994, he was the first world leader to condemn the massacre of the Tutsis as a genocide. In 1995, during his third visit to Kenya before an audience of 300,000, John Paul II pleaded for an end to the violence in Rwanda and Burundi, urging forgiveness and reconciliation as a solution to the genocide. He told Rwandan and Burundian refugees that he "was close to them and shared their immense pain". He said:


title: Pope John Paul II

text: What is happening in your countries is a terrible tragedy that must end. During the African Synod, we, the pastors of the church, felt the duty to express our consternation and to launch an appeal for forgiveness and reconciliation. This is the only way to dissipate the threats of ethnocentrism that are hovering over Africa these days and that have so brutally touched Rwanda and Burundi.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: While taking a traditional position on human sexuality, maintaining the Catholic Church's moral opposition to homosexual acts, John Paul II asserted that people with homosexual inclinations possess the same inherent dignity and rights as others. In his book "Memory and Identity", he referred to the "strong pressures" by the European Parliament to recognise homosexual unions as an alternative type of family, with the right to adopt children. In the book, as quoted by Reuters, he wrote: "It is legitimate and necessary to ask oneself if this is not perhaps part of a new ideology of evil, more subtle and hidden, perhaps, intent upon exploiting human rights themselves against man and against the family."


title: Pope John Paul II

text: In 1986, the Pope approved the release of a document from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith regarding "Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on the Pastoral Care of Homosexual Persons". While not neglecting to comment on homosexuality and moral order, the letter issued multiple affirmations of the dignity of homosexual persons.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: A 1997 study determined that of all the pope's public statements, only 3% addressed the issue of sexual morality.


title: Pope John Paul II

text: John Paul II completed a full-scale reform of the Catholic Church's legal system, Latin and Eastern, and a reform of the Roman Curia.