It would be impossible to count the number of words that have been spoken and penned in the last few days about the poet, philosopher, priest and prelate who died on Saturday. News networks have opined non-stop: from interviewing almost anyone who would sit still long enough for questions about what the pontiff’s legacy might become, or what their single, shining moment in his presence had been like, to the value of the Vatican’s vast art collection (one euro on the Holy See accounting ledger; inestimable according to Christie’s and Sotheby’s.)

Much of the information offered about the life of Karol Wojtyla/John Paul II was fascinating; bits of it were endearing – almost all of it was inspiring. But the news “factoid” that stopped me cold was this one: the Pope, since his most recent hospitalization, had been undergoing speech therapy. At the age of 84, with muscles frozen by Parkinson’s, a fresh tracheotomy scar and a new feeding tube, the old man was quietly and resolutely working to regain…his voice.

On the Easter Sunday before his death, he was raised to his residence window overlooking St. Peter’s Square – and he lifted his fluttering hand in blessing to the crowds below, and tried to speak. He couldn’t. No words came – and the look on his face betrayed utter frustration at his failing. Unintelligible sounds came out. But no words. And that was the world’s last look at a man who had seldom been at loss for them.

From his lips and from his pen, a steady flow of words had blessed, admonished, challenged, pleaded, evoked, inspired, reproved, directed, encouraged, interceded, delighted and honored. For years he communicated with a writer’s precision, an actor’s grace, and a father’s steady gravitas.

But in the end, he did it without words.

One Polish nun who’d often seen him pray said, “When he prayed, it was physical. He sighed deeply and made grunting sounds like a lion.” So maybe that Easter morning wasn’t the first time words failed him. And maybe by the time they had…he didn’t need them anymore.

Maybe what the heart feels most keenly can’t be pressed neatly into language. Maybe true passion leaves us all a little tongue tied. And maybe, just maybe, there are things waiting to be said that will one day carry us far, far beyond words.

“For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body…for we do not know how to pray as we should, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words…” (Romans 8:22-23; 26)

© Leigh McLeroy 2005