On October 14, 2018, Pope Francis will canonize Pope Paul VI, along with martyred Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero. Pope Paul VI, despite his enormous impact on the Church\u2014the most obvious being the reform of the liturgy brought about by the Second Vatican Council\u2014is curiously obscure to many Americans. He is perhaps best known for his 1968 encyclical \u201cHumanae<\/i>\u00a0Vitae<\/i>\u201d (\u201cOf Human Life\u201d), which upheld the Church\u2019s controversial ban on the use of artificial birth control.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nPaul VI has the disadvantage of being sandwiched between two far more charismatic personalities: Pope John XXIII and Pope John Paul II (elected after Pope John Paul I\u2019s month long reign). His was often the unglamorous work of a bureaucrat, not of a beloved papa figure like John or a superstar evangelist like John Paul II. But as the man charged with implementing an enormously controversial council and shepherding the Church in its transition to facing the modern world as a renewed evangelistic force, he faced titanic challenges with intelligence, resolve, and deep holiness.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nGiovanni Battista Enrico Antonio Maria Montini was born on September 26, 1897, the last pope born in the 19th century. He was ordained in 1920, became a bishop in 1954, and was named a cardinal in 1958. He was a cleric groomed for the papacy by his work in the Vatican, serving in the Secretariat of State (1922\u201354) and witnessing the torments of what was arguably the most violent century in history.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nAt the pope\u2019s request, from 1939 to 1947, Montini created an office that worked to find over 11 million displaced persons and provide refugees with shelter, food, and other material assistance. In addition, he helped escaped Allied POWs, Jews, anti-Fascists, Socialists, Communists, and others. It gave him a unique perspective and skill set for the work to which God would call him when Pope John XXIII died in the summer of 1963, having convened the Second Vatican Council in October 1962.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nJohn XXIII initially hoped the council would be able to finish its work by December 1962, after a single two-month session. Montini, with a more realistic grasp of the immense challenges facing the Church, remarked of his friend wryly, \u201cThis old boy does not know what a hornets\u2019 nest he is stirring up.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nAs pope, Paul VI accomplished so much that it is difficult to summarize in a mere 2,500 words. His biographer, Peter Hebblethwaite, gives a reasonable assessment of his crowded papal career (stretching from June 1963 to August 1978) with these words:\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cHe managed to complete the council without dividing the Church. He reformed the Roman Curia without alienating it. He introduced collegiality without ever letting it undermine his papal office. He practiced ecumenism without impairing Catholic identity. He had an\u00a0Ostpolitik\u00a0<\/i>[way of negotiating with Communists] that involved neither surrender nor bouncing aggressivity. He was \u2018open to the world\u2019 without ever being its dupe. He pulled off the most difficult trick of all: combining openness with fidelity.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n