Pope John Paul II Changed Everything — Even How We Met

Pope John Paul II changed everything for us — even how we met.

In this special episode, released for his feast day, we share how St. John Paul II shaped our lives, our marriage, and our mission. His call for a New Evangelization didn’t just renew the Church — it gave us direction, purpose, and eventually, each other.

Transcript

Hey, welcome back. Today we're remembering Pope John Paul II because he had a particular influence on our lives together and in one way I don't know if we would have ever met without his influence. It happens to be also his feast day. So a great time to recall the great blessing that John Paul 2 has been in all of our lives. So Janelle, how has John Paul II influenced you and impacted your life? Well, first of all, I think just growing up in the era of Pope John Paul II, it just you felt like there was a safety within the church and you were just so happy to be a part of the Catholic faith. I remember being really proud of the fact that, you know, I was a Catholic. And maybe that was just the culture that was kind of instilled in our family. But um I know many years later someone told me, "Did you know that Pope John Paul II became pope on your birthday?" But it was like 3 or 4 years before I was actually born. So he was he was became pope in 1978 and on October 16th. Oh really? Yeah. I did not know that. Yeah. So but really I think where the most profound experience that I had with Pope John Paul II was when I got to go to World Youth Day in uh the year 2000. And prior to this I had a bunch of cousins who had went to Denver. And I remember I was too young to go to Denver. And I had just heard how incredible it was this experience of World Youth Day and getting to see the Pope. And so, uh, when I was 18, I went to Europe with a group of young adults and, uh, for the Jubilee Year, which was 25 years ago already. I can't believe that. And had my first encounter with Pope John Paul II. And I remember at the opening ceremonies, he was literally like 4t away from me. We were right in St. Peter Square and his Pope mobile came right by. And I had my camera, not digital, camera with film, and uh, I got some really good photos of him. Nice. Yeah. And then after that encounter um I went to university for a year and then I went to a Bible school when I was uh 19 years old and it was called the John Paul 2 Bible School and there I had a really uh profound experience just in terms of my faith uh life but I know that he had a great influence on that school and that college and I think your experience of all of this set within you an understanding of we need to share our faith with other people. Oh 100%. It was just like we are part of John Paul 2's like we're part of his club or it was it was greater than a club like it was like there was this big mission that we all had to go share the truth book Christ. Yeah. And I think that was a big theme with Pope John Paul II was that we are missionary that the church exists in order to evangelize. It doesn't exist just for the sake of its members but for those who had have not encountered Christ and then I think you really experienced the sense of that through all of that. But I know for myself because when I was 18 years old, had a real powerful encounter with Christ. I I experienced him in a real tangible way at a retreat. And when I left that, Jesus was alive to me. Like, wow, he's he's a real person. And someone mentioned something about an encyclical that John Paul II had written. And I I remember going down to the local book, Catholic bookstore, finding it, buying it, reading it, reading it again, highlighting it, making notes in the margins. And what that encyclical was called was mission of the redeemer. And it was basically John Paul II's urgent call for Catholics to share Christ with people. And I I got a real sense of I'm being invited into something that's bigger than myself. I'm on a mission. And at the at this time, I thought this was so exciting. Particularly, a couple passages stood out for me. I still remember them from years ago, but we'd like to share a couple of those with you. I sense that the moment has come to commit all of the church's energies to a new evangelization. No believer in Christ, no institution of the church can avoid the supreme duty to proclaim Christ to all peoples. I remember reading this and being so excited. Okay, I can share my faith with people. I I didn't know that was part of the Catholic identity at that time. Uh combined with this new found faith in Christ. I mean, I just poured, he says, you know, it's time since I'm going to come to commit all the church's energies to a new evangelization. Well, all my energies went into this new evangelization. At this time, I would look strategically for ways to bring up Christ with people on campus as a university student. Um, as I finished my degree, I I thought, well, how can I share Christ with people? And I got ended up being hired by seven different Catholic churches to start from scratch a brand new youth program. And I remember sitting in that first board meeting with all the people who were interviewing me. And I said, the goal of my this youth ministry is going to be proclaiming Christ to the kids so that they encounter him personally and then they go forward to share Christ with others. If if you don't want this, don't hire me. Mhm. And I remember there was a sister at the end of the room and she started clapping. She was so excited. Anyways, was hired and I poured all my energies into this youth group. And then long story short, from 1999, then in about 2002, I started getting so many calls to speak outside the youth groups that I was working with. We ended up forming an organization called Faceto-Face Ministries, which is a Catholic evangelization ministry, which still exists today. But at the very beginning, it was like friends coming together to proclaim Christ to people through youth retreats. And this is how Mhm. we met. Yeah, that's right. Actually, you you you had been the backup singer for the World Youth Day theme song singer. It's a mouthful. When John Paul the 2 came. John Paul the Two. John Paul. Sorry. Please forgive me. Anyways, our path had crossed prior and now you were coming to Saskatoon and I said, "Hey, come join our team doing these youth retreats and it was an extremely fruitful time with this sense that we are part of something bigger than ourselves to proclaim Christ to all people for the purpose of what? Conversion." And what is conversion? I would always go back to Pope John Paul II's encyclical letter and his understanding of conversion as the motivation for everything that we're doing. Like to share it with you. The proclamation of the word of God has Christian conversion as its aim. A complete and sincere adherence to Christ and his gospel through faith. Conversion means accepting by a personal decision the saving sovereignty of Christ and becoming his disciple. So this little sentence, conversion means accepting by personal decision the saving sovereignty of Christ and becoming his disciple. This sentence was so foundational to everything that we did in youth ministry at that time and even now. But back then it was like hey are you aware of consciously making a commitment to Jesus Christ and living for him? Deciding to say I want to live for you. Um so we would ask this question of the audiences that we served. We'd ask this question of thousands of people and particularly on one event that we did across Western Canada called the face tof face retreat. It would be in the context of musical eucharistic adoration which we did with thousands and thousands of people where we would ask this question. Are you aware of surrendering yourself to Jesus? Are you aware of giving your life to him? And if you've never done did this before, I would say if you would like to as a sign of your first time conscious and public commitment to Jesus Christ, I welcome you to stand to your feet. And I did this I I can't even know I don't even know how many times. And we would see literally thousands of people respond which was really telling because I think most Catholics are not aware of a concrete conscious public commitment to him which is quite shocking because every time we go forward to receive the eukarist we are committing ourselves to Jesus Christ in a public way or we can we can go up in a mechanical way but every time we receive It is a time to renew our relationship with him. And so, Pope John Paul II had a profound impact on how we shared the faith at that time. The mission of going forward really brought us together. Uh, and that mission that we continue today here on YouTube as our kids run above us playing horsey. I don't know if you can hear the thumping thump thump thump thump thump. St. Pope John Paul II said, "Sometimes even Catholics have lost or never had the chance to experience Christ personally, not Christ as a mere paradigm or value, but as the living Lord, the way, the truth, and the life." I would often think of the statement by Pope John Paul II where he said, "Sometimes a Catholic has never experienced Christ personally, not as a mere value, but as a living Lord, the way, the truth, and the life." And I think why is that? How do we miss that? Well, sometimes I think a person has just never been invited and ask the question say have you ever made a commitment to live your life for Jesus? So we would invite people to do that and it was very very very fruitful especially in those early years. Now that doesn't mean that this is a one-time decision. Don't misunderstand this invitation as uh like a once- saved all we saved. It's not. It's not. It's a commitment. A conversion means accepting by personal decision the saving sovereignty of Christ and becoming that's an important word becoming his disciple. It's a decision to keep on making a decision. It's a decision that sets your life up in a different direction. That is to become a disciple, a multiplying disciple of Jesus Christ. And that first decision is pretty important because a 100% of people who do not take step one don't take step two. And so those early years of ministry was really step one. Are you aware of living for Jesus Christ striving to becoming his disciple? And this has been directly impacted in our lives from John Paul too. This was his language that really impacted us, impacted me, continues to this day. Uh and at that time I really saw it as the solution to the crisis within the church. And now looking back I think yes that's part of the solution. evangelization. But I think there's another component to it that uh the next pope came along and offered it an enriched understanding and that is Pope Benedict the 16th where he saw the crisis in the church in due in large part to the disintegration of the liturgy which is where we are today. Incidentally, if you want to learn a little bit more about that, we've started a whole series on the sacred liturgy. First episode was just released a couple days ago. We'll link at the end if you want to dive deeper. But is there any closing comments you want to say? I I feel like it was a real privilege to be alive during the era of Pope John Paul II. I think it there was just like this hopefulness in the church. Um, I can't say that that's always been my sentiment in the recent years, but I really do feel grateful that my young adult life was during that time. Me too. Me too. So grateful for that season of life. Mhm. St. John Paul II, pray for us. I leave you now with this prayer. that the Lord Jesus that he will give you the strength to go out and profess that you are Christian that he will show you that he alone can fill your hearts accept his freedom and embrace his truth. truth and be messengers of the certainty that you have been truly liberated through the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus. God bless you.