In 1944, Joseph Stalin famously impugned papal military power in a quip to Winston Churchill, when he inquired of the British Prime Minister: “The Pope? How many divisions does he have?” In one sense, the communist dictator was correct. The dearth of weapons and soldiers within the Vatican City State hardly positions the world’s smallest nation as a serious military power. But Stalin failed to recognize the deeper power wielded by the pope – not as sovereign of Vatican City State, a creation of the 1929 Lateran Treaty – but as the Supreme Pastor of the Universal Church, established and entrusted by the Good Shepherd Himself. Had Stalin lived longer than his earthly sojourn allowed, he would have seen papal power at work in the extraordinary moral witness of Saint John Paul II, who helped topple the very regime Stalin thought invincible. Indeed, popes have much to teach the world about the art of war and peace.
At his most recent Sunday Angelus, Pope Leo cautioned against continued machinations of force in the Middle East. He addressed the crowd, saying, “War does not solve problems; on the contrary, it amplifies them and inflicts deep wounds on the history of peoples, which take generations to heal … May diplomacy silence the weapons! May nations chart their futures with works of peace, not with violence and bloodstained conflicts!”
As the leader of the oldest continually operating diplomatic corps in the world, the pope offers the world and its leaders words of wisdom and sound instruction: not because the pope is the head of a tiny country, but because he wields a voice of truth, which is more potent than any weapon or army.
