[JustPiper]

Assassination attempt

A hand holding a gun aims from the crowd at Pope John Paul II as he rides through St Peter's Square at the Vatican on May 13, 1981. An instant later he was shot. Following a 41-hour-operation the next day, the Pope went on to make a full recovery. The gunman, Mehmet Ali Agca, was immediately arrested. He was pardoned in June 2000, a month after the Pope revealed that the attempt on his life was the last of three 'secrets of Fatima', revealed to three Portuguese shepherd children who claimed to have seen the Virgin Mary's apparition in 1917. Photo: ADN Kronos / AP The life of Pope John Paul II

[Remole]

Just to follow up: then, in December 1983, the Pope visited Ali Agca in his cell in Rebibbia prison (the photo at # 9 was taken at the end of the visit), during which visit the Pope stated that he had forgiven his assailant. I was living in Rome at the time, and even the most secular Italian was moved by that gesture.