Kultura gestu i słowa Jana Pawła II

Fr. Jan SOCHOŃ

Department of Philosophy of Culture, Faculty of Christian Philosophy, Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski University, Wójcickiego 1/3, 01-938 Warsaw, Poland , Polska

Abstrakt

In the article, the category of the “culture of gesture and word” is implemented in order to show how words accompanied by specific gestures played an important role in the pastoral activity of Karol Wojtyla, and later Pope John Paul II. In the case of the late Pope one may even speak about a hermeneutics of gesture. While drawing on certain classical theses of metaphysical anthropology, the author demonstrates how John Paul II succeeded in restoring the lost meanings of some gestures and in creating absolutely new ones which, in time, were commonly accepted and became part of a wide range of  symbolic behaviours. Among the famous gestures made by John Paul II during his travels were putting on an Indian feather headdress, expressing elation over the break dance performed in front of him by young people or gaily waving his walking stick. These and other gestures of this kind were received with great enthusiasm and joy as they showed the Pope’s admiration for cultures and traditions other than european. At the same time they visibly expressed John Paul II’s spiritual zeal and epitomized the creativity inherent in God’s relation to man, revealed in the saving ministry of Christ. Not infrequently did the message John Paul II conveyed to the world, as well as the gestures that accompanied it, create situations surprising also in the semiotic sense: they would awaken entire peoples from their religious or political «slumber» (the latter being the case with Poles) and enhance their sense of pride with their histories and cultures. Pope John Paul II triggered off chains of gestures of goodwill, thus generating human solidarity, strenghtening people’s faith in God as well as their openess to others. Side by side with cementing the social bonds, he was creating a broad perspective of thinking in which life is a human pilgrimage to God. The concluding parts of the article focus on John Paul II’s theology of vision, manifested in particular throughout his interactions with people, and on his gesture of kissing the soil of the nations he visited. Both these gestures are analyzed with regard to their impact on broadly defined contemporary religious, social and political culture.

Słowa kluczowe:

culture, gesture, word, solemn speech, body, hermeneutics, Rhapsodic Theatre, theology of vision, mysticism, kissing the soil, the functions of language, pastoral care, liturgy, liturgical gestures