Pope’s Attacker barred from funeral
Agca shot the pope in the abdomen during a general audience in St. Peter’s Square on the anniversary of the 1917 apparition of Jesus’ mother, the Virgin Mary, near Fatima in Portugal.
The pope said he believed the Virgin Mary had intervened to save his life. Agca has over the years insisted this made him part of a divine plan, which the Vatican has rejected.
“The divine plan has reached its conclusion. So we are at the end of the world,” Agca wrote in the letter. He also said he was rewriting the Bible and would soon reveal “Fatima’s secret.”
Over the years, Agca has given conflicting reasons for his attempt on John Paul’s life, including allegations of a conspiracy with Bulgaria’s communist-era secret services and the Soviet KGB.
Agca belonged to a right-wing militant faction in Turkey in the late 1970s and was sentenced to prison for the 1979 murder of a liberal newspaper editor.
A year before traveling to Rome, he escaped from jail with suspected help from right-wing sympathizers in the Turkish security apparatus.
Turkish authorities have always denied any connection with Agca and have dismissed him as mentally unstable.
Mentally unstable? You think?
It’s not necessary for a guy like Agca – after all, a would be killer – to be totally sane or normal! In any case, the Pope forgave him, which IMHO was one of the highlights of his papacy, and according to some reports, the two even became friends! In the spirit of Christian forgiveness, I *would* like to see Agca attend the funeral, even if handcuffed and with full security. Even inside a cage or anything! It would be a fantastic example of the power of forgiving, I think.