George Weigel - Lessons for Statesmen (and Sinners) - John Paul II’s wisdom in statecraft offers a model for today

St. John Paul II’s Seven Lessons for Statesmen (and Sinners)

BY PETER JESSERER SMITH

John Paul II was not canonized for his accomplishments but for his sanctity. Yet he was the most politically consequential pope in decades, and it is a very obscure part of the world that does not display the footprints of the shoes of this fisherman. George Weigel analyzes seven lessons that John Paul’s “worldly” accomplishments teach twenty-first century statesmen, and suggests a few things the first Polish pope has to teach the rest of us.
St. John Paul II’s pontificate offers seven valuable lessons on exercising prudence in the modern world, according to the saint’s Witness to Hope biographer.

“No pope, going back to St. Peter, gets everything right,” said George Weigel, director of Catholic studies at the Ethics and Public Policy Center (EPPC), a Washington think tank dedicated to “applying the Judeo-Christian moral tradition to critical issues of public policy.”

Asked Weigel, “So what does it mean for a pope to exercise prudence in a heroic and exemplary way?”

Weigel was delivering the William E. Simon lecture at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington on Feb. 4 called: “St. John Paul II: Lessons for Statesmen (and Sinners).”

Weigel said Pope John Paul II was a pastor who refused the role of “diplomat” or “politician,” but, instead, used “moral witness” to become “the most politically consequential pope in centuries.”

The Witness to Hope biographer said he found that any pope’s heroic exercise of prudence lay in “the steady determination to make decisions about situations and personalities without fear and without seeking favor” and “always trying to bring one’s best judgments on circumstances and people to bear, even if that involves difficulties and costs.”

He added that a pope’s heroic prudence also included a great ability to read “the signs of the times” in a way that “opens up opportunities for evangelically inspired action.”

When it came to St. John Paul II, Weigel said seven lessons could be learned “from the global statecraft of a saint who had a real impact in what the ‘punditocracy’ likes to call the real world.”

• The first lesson: “Culture comes first,” 
• The second lesson: “Ideas count for good or for ill.”
• The third lesson: “Don’t psychologize the adversy.”
• The fourth lesson: “Speak loudly and be supple, deploying whatever sticks, big or small, you have at hand.”
• The fifth lesson was: “Listen to the martyrs.”
• The sixth lesson was: “Think long-term, and do not sacrifice core principles to what seems to be an immediate advantage.”
• The seventh and final lesson was: “Media reality is not necessarily reality, and statesmen cannot play acolyte to such narratives.”

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