Vatican City (CNA) – The former secretary of the late Pope John Paul II has revealed new details about the life of the Servant of God.
Information regarding an attack in 1982 and his last public appearance is being shown in a documentary on the Pontiff’s life titled, Testimony.
Testimony, a film based on the memoir A life with Karol by Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz and Italian journalist Gian Franco Svidercoschi, is narrated by British actor Michael York, was viewed by Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican premiere on October 16. It also includes interviews with Cardinal Dzwisz, the current archbishop of Krakow, Poland who served for many years as the late Pontiff’s private secretary.
Along with information from the memoir, new additions have also been made.
The documentary explains how on May 12, 1982, during a visit to the shrine in Fatima, Portugal, a Spanish priest attacked the Holy Father with a knife.
During the incident, reports Reuters, the priest “was knocked to the ground by police and arrested.”
But the general public did not know that the knife had struck the Pontiff. “I can now reveal that the Holy Father was wounded,” Cardinal Dziwisz says in the documentary, according to news agency Reuters.
“When we got back to the room (in the Fatima sanctuary complex) there was blood.”
The film also includes John Paul II’s last public appearance in St Peter’s Square, when he was unable to speak due to his illness and being overcome by emotion. After the incident, Dziwisz recalled that the late pontiff managed to whisper, “If I can’t speak any more, it’s time for me to go.” John Paul II died at 84 on April 2, 2005.
After the screening, Benedict XVI said that the film “takes our minds back to that late evening of October 16, 1978, thirty years ago today, which has remained engraved in everyone’s heart” Benedict XVI said, and recalled the late Pope’s first words to the crowd waiting to greet their new shepherd, “If I make a mistake (in the language) you will correct me.”
Encapsulating the life of the Pontiff, Pope Benedict said: “We could say that the pontificate of John Paul II is enclosed between two expressions: ‘Open the doors to Christ. Do not be afraid,’ and his words on his deathbed: ‘Let me go to the house of the Father’.”
“Testimony reveals previously unknown episodes,” and displays “the human simplicity, the firm courage and, finally, the suffering of John Paul II, which he faced to the end with his inborn hardiness and the patience of a humble servant of the Gospel.The film also gives us a better understanding of John Paul II’s homeland, Poland, and of its cultural and religious traditions,” Pope Benedict XVI said.
“It enables us to revisit famous events in ecclesial and civil life, and episodes of which most people are unaware.
“The whole story is recounted with the affection of one who shared closely in these events, living in the shadow of their protagonist.”