Pope Paul VI (1963-1978)

Today marks the death of Pope Paul VI (1897-1978), born Giovanni Battista Montini. Born in Brescia, he was ordained in 1920. After earning a degree in Canon Law, he entered the Vatican Secretariat of State. He worked there until 1954, when he was named Archbishop of Milan. In 1958 he was named a Cardinal. In 1961 he was appointed to the Central Preparatory Commission for the upcoming Second Vatican Council which Pope John XXIII had announced. When Pope John XXIII died of cancer in June 1963, right in the middle of the Second Vatican Council, he was succeeded by Cardinal Montini, who took the name Paul VI. He continued the council, which produced 16 documents: 4 contitutions, 9 decrees and 3 declarations. Paul’s pontificate, as we know, was a tumultuous period, and it took a toll on his health. He was succeeded in August 1978 by John Paul I (1978). The Vatican website notes:

His successful conclusion of Vatican II has left its mark on the history of the Church, but history will also record his rigorous reform of the Roman curia, his well-received address to the UN in 1965, his encyclical Populorum Progressio (1967), his second great social letter Octogesima Adveniens (1971)—the first to show an awareness of many problems that have only recently been brought to light—and his apostolic exhortation Evangelii Nuntiandi, his last major pronouncement which also touched on the central question of the just conception of liberation and salvation.