Labels:text | human face | man | person OCR: ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ John Paul II John Paul II When Karol Wojtyla was elected Pope John Paul II in 1978, he became the first non-Italian Pope in 455 years and the first-ever Pole to be chosen as leader of the Roman Catholic Church. Fluent in many languages, he acted as an international ambassador for Catholicism, but his refusal to relax the church's prohibitions on contraception, abortion, and married priests earned him many enemies. He grew up in an intensely Catholic country, which, from 1939, was ruled successively by a brutal occupying power and an atheistic Communist regime. He developed a strong belief in traditional Catholic values and a mission to promote them worldwide. On becoming pope he embarked on a punishing schedule of visits throughout the world, using his knowledge of languages to conduct huge open-air services. John Paul II, religious leader and pope, His high profile made him a prime terrorist 1920. target, and in 1981 he was shot and seriously wounded. He soon recovered and made no attempt to modify his controversial views on politics, individual morality, or the nature of the priesthood. CHRONOLOGY
