Alfredo Stroessner the dictator of Paraguay and Alberto Fujimori of Peru were also well received by the Pope and blessed by him.  Former Argentinean president Carlos Menem thanked the Pope for his support of his decision to pardon Videla,  Massera and their followers  who murdered and caused the disappearance of tens of thousands during the military juntas that ruled Argentina. A book written by Bruno Passarelli and Fernando Elenberg  denounces, the complicity of then Nuncio (Ambassador of the Vatican)  Pio Laghi with the military dictatorship at the time, and the role of the Catholic church in one of the most horrendous violation of human rights ever committed; as the church cooperated with a military junta which murdered and disappeared more than 30 thousand.  

Las Madres de la Plaza de Mayo, the families of those who were murdered in Chile, El Salvador and other places will not go along with the idea of having Pope Paul made a saint.   March 24th which was the 25th anniversary of the assassination of Monsignor Romero makes one remember many things.  One of the things one remembers is when the Monsignor went to Rome to seek help in stopping the bloody repression that was taking place against the people; the massacres that included the murder of priests committed by the military junta aided by and supported by the US. 

After being denied an audience time after time, Romero was able to talk to the Pope for a few minutes.  According to Romero himself, the Pope became angry when he was presented the documents and photos depicting the brutal repression in that country.  According to Romero the Pope angrily said, "We have told you that you shouldn't come loaded with so many papers".  When Romero declared,  "They killed Father Octavio, denouncing him as a guerrilla.  A thing which is not true as I ordained him and know that he is a pious man whose only concern was to help the poor", while holding a photo of the priest crushed body as he had been run over by an army tank, Pope Paul II coldly asked, "And wasn't he a guerilla?", adding if you overcome the differences you have with the government and cooperate with them you will work for Christian peace.  You should consider the government as your friend.  With these words he ended the audience with Monsignor Romero.  A few months later the Monsignor was assassinated while giving mass.

The Pope's intense hatred for Communism is not a secret.  From this perspective many compare this Pope with Pio XII, the Pope who put aside the atrocities of Hitler and cooperated fully with the Nazis as they, "Represent a barrier and are Christian fighters against the Soviet Union and Stalin.  Some see the same parallel between Pope Paul II and Ronald Reagan. 

Referring to the creation of a overt campaign against the Socialist block, former National Security Advisor, Richard Allen, declared that in June 1982, "the largest secret alliance of all times was created to bring down Communism".  From that time on tons of money was given to Solidarity in Poland as well as so called dissidents in Czechoslovakia, Hungary and East Germany.

According to the book written by Carl Bernstein and Marco Politi, "John Paul II and the Hidden History of our Time", CIA director William J. Casey and US Vatican ambassador Vernon Walters were in constant contact and cooperated fully with the Pontiff to bring down Communism.  The irony of all this was that in a 1991 mass the Pope declared that, "Communism had seeds of truth".  It is important to know that in his last years he denounced the global economy, denouncing the foreign debts of poor nations, supporting debt relief and condemning external debt as it impoverished the people of the world.   

But it is also true that he never dared to pressure the most powerful nation of the world into making concessions as to better the conditions of the poor around the globe.  He silently obeyed the dictates of Washington.  In 1998, for example, he announced that he would make a pilgrimage to the land of Abraham in the town of Iraq in 1999.  He did not go because the US Department of State would not issue him a visa.  

Since the beginning of his reign, Pope John Paul II demonstrated a total dislike of all progressive movements, going against those programs, groups and individuals who were fighting for social change;  he was against those changes which aimed to eradicate exploitation and social injustice; he was against those changes that believed in the redistribution of wealth.  In 1983 he fiercely opposed Liberation Theology, a Theology, created by Father Gustavo Gutiérrez, among others, based on the belief that, "Gods teachings should be utilized to free man from all those conditions that deface man and that prevents him from living the way God would want him to live".  The Pope denounced these postulates as dangerous, and as such, he secretly ordered the Second Conference of the Vatican, of Puebla and Medillin to announce that, "The creation of the Church of the Poor for the creation of a new society".       

He used this as a tool to silence Fathers Leonardo Boff and Gélder Cámara of Brazil, Gustavo Gutiérrez of Peru, Samuel Ruiz García of México, Ernesto Cardenal of Nicaragua, Tissa Balasuriya of Sri Lanka and all those priests who believed in Liberation Theology as a means of liberating man and in the process creating a new just and harmonious society.  The Pope's dictatorial nature is demonstrated in his banning of books relating to Liberation Theology and the persecution of Boff, Proaño and Gutíerrez by the Vatican.

It is sad that to know that the death of John Paul II will not signal a change or a return to the church of the poor.  All indications are that the successor will be more conservative and reactionary.  Among the many candidates, one who has good possibility of becoming the next Pope is the extreme right winger, German Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, a man also known as the "inquisitor of the Vatican".

God help us all.