Karol Wojtyla was born in Wadowice, Poland, on 18 May 1920. He was ordained a priest in 1946, and named auxiliary bishop of Krakow in 1958, and archbishop of Krakow in 1964. On 16 October 1978, he was elected Pope and assumed the name John Paul II. In 1994 he published, together with Vittorio Messori, Crossing the Threshold of Hope, followed by a memoir, Rise, Let Us Be On Our Way. He died in April 2005.
