He has earned his wingsI think it's pretty obvious the reasons behind this fast process. The Catholic Church has seen a decline in the number of its followers, the reason being, of course, its boy-raping priests and the church's idleness to deal with it. As it was expected, the catholic Church didn't like this one bit. Giancarlo Zizola, John Paul II's biographer told Spanish newspaper El Pais:
These are bad times for the Roman Church and the beatification appears as trying an urgent therapy. It seems like they are trying to reproduce the massive consensus regarding the last papacy to cover the actual crisis. Zizola thinks that there is an interest among movements like Opus Dei and Communion and Liberation to appropriate John Paul II's figure to strengthen its actual role"
John Paul lived in another time, an easier time than the one Ratzinger has. John Paul II didn't have to suffer the internet diffusing with no restraints all the hypocrisy and perversion the Catholic Church is capable of. Catholics' selective memory was helped by that time's media, which never did many efforts to spread the sexual abuses committed by the priests. Add to that the fact that the secular movement wasn't as strong as it is today.
This is why John Paul II is remembered as someone sublime, almost like a modern-day saint. Considering the crisis the Catholic Church is suffering, why not take advantage of such fame? Doing so allows the church to create a bridge between it and the faithful who started to see estranged and away the church that for many years had control over so many people.Now this generation can say "We have a blessed among us! We have someone especial! God is still with us!"
We have to admit that John Paul did some good in the world, like his criticism towards the communists (you can say whatever you want about American capitalist imperialism, but I don't think a Soviet-controlled world would have been better) or helping Chile and Argentina to achieve peace. But this in no way erase his activism against contraceptives, especially in AIDS-ridden Africa, or against gays.
And who can forget his friend Marcial Maciel?
Pope who turned blind eye to priestly abuse set to be beatified
Most notoriously of all, John Paul took no action at all against the Mexican priest Marcial Maciel Degollado, founder of the Legionaries of Christ, who was beset by allegations of sexual abuse for decades. It eventually emerged that he was a drug addict who had fathered several children with two different women and had also committed numerous acts of sexual abuse, some with his own children. But Degollado was an authoritarian conservative after John Paul's own stripe, and John Paul would hear no ill of him. It was left to his successor to force him to retire to "a life of penitence".
"In more than 25 years as the most powerful religious figure on the planet," commented Barbara Blaine, head of Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (Snap), "John Paul II did almost nothing to safeguard kids." Because of this she urged the church to postpone the beatification, to "avoid rubbing more salt into these wounds".
Maybe John Paul didn't really know who Maciel was. However, he knew exactly what he was looking for and what kind of people he needed to achieve it
John Paul II's dark allyMarcial Maciel died without ever going to prison for his crimes, neither judged for them. If there is a miracle we can actually attribute to John Paul II, it is to have protected a rapist for so long and even after dead
For his battle, he needed an unconditional army. He had no use for Franciscans, Dominicans or Jesuits. They were to busy with the poor. Almost in the Marxist realm. Enemies of the powerful. Wojtyla found new recruits in the Opus, the Kikos, the Lumen Dei, the Communoin and Liberation and the Legion of Christ. Together they jumped in the time machine and went back to the 50s, to a church with a centralized power and with no place for dissidence. And decided that such church had to be the one of the new millennium. Maciel was one of the leaders
This is the guy venerated by old people who see in him the one they were trained to love and obey, and by young ones, who they see as the wonderful figure with they grow up, go up to the altar and scratch the skies. They even have relics, a vial with John Paul II's blood, in case someone thought this couldn't get even more medieval, a time the Catholic Church would love to see brought back
This is a very clever move by the Catholic Church, but not really surprising. To take advantage of its followers' gullibility is just normal for them.
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