Bono and the Pope

Bono, who met Pope John Paul II during the Jubilee 2000 campaign for African debt relief,
remembers him as "a street fighter and a wily campaigner on behalf of the world's poor."
 
 "We would never have gotten the debts of 23 countries completely canceled without him," Bono said in Los Angeles,
where U2 is winding up its six-date Southern California stand this week. At Saturday's concert in Anaheim, Bono
praised the pontiff as a great showman. Explaining that he kept the rosary beads the pope presented him in his pocket
during shows, he dangled them from the microphone during Miracle Drug, then kneeled and crossed himself.

In an interview earlier, he described the pope as "deeply conservative."

"In Ireland, a lot of people were very upset by his failure to embrace contraception as a necessity, not just for modern life
but for the life of the poor in Africa and other places he worked so very hard to help," Bono said. "I knew his convictions
were very real, and I've learned to respect conservative positions I don't hold."

Bono, along with rocker Bob Geldof, producer Quincy Jones and Harvard economics professor Jeffrey Sachs,
visited the pontiff's summer residence in Castelgandolfo, Italy, in September 2000 to seek support for debt relief.

"We were laughing nervously like boys in the back of the class," Bono recalled. "Geldof was pinching me,
and Quincy was pointing to the pope's oxblood loafers."

The mood changed when the pope, already in frail health, spoke.

"All of us were almost moved to tears to see how much he wanted to be there, to see him struggle to stand," Bono said.
"He talked about the difference between rich and poor as the biggest threat to humanity. He meant it in the security sense and the moral sense."

Bono discovered another facet.

"He had mischief in his eyes as well as godliness," he says. "If the Catholic Church is the glam rock of religion,
this guy was just the most vivid of performers."

While they were seated together, Bono noticed the pope staring at him. Concerned that his powder-blue "fly shades"
were an offensive accessory, Bono removed them. When Bono approached to receive the rosary beads, the pope
continued eyeing the sunglasses.

"So I asked if he wanted them," Bono said. "He not only nodded, but he put them on and made the wickedest smile.
It was a great moment for a lot of reasons, and one of them was, I thought, 'We'll be on the front page of every newspaper.'
I don't mean me, but our issues. I knew what a picture of the pope in sunglasses was going to do."

Many photos were taken. None surfaced.
"The Vatican courtiers didn't have the same sense of humor as the pontiff," Bono said.
"They could imagine the T-shirts. We'll never see those photos."
 


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