Pope Wojtyla's Friend

Today he continues to delight people with his new songs. During his 45-year career we remember him as a rebellious youngster publishing anti-war songs, and as a mature rock-musician claiming that care for family comes before art. We also remember him as a man who was a friend to the saintly Pope John Paul ll. And just as we start thinking that Dylan has passed into history, he emerges with a new and even better album!

Ten years ago at the Eucharistic Conference in Bologna , Bob Dylan shared the stage with the Holy Father. And just as he did at the end of the ‘70's through the songs on the album “Slow Train a Comin',” he once again revealed the driving force of his spirituality, which is based on the way of Christ.

But on the eve of that Congress, not everyone agreed about Dylan, namely the present Pope Benedict XVI, and the then Pope John Paul II who he confronted on the issue of the American star taking part in the Eucharistic Congress.

This was revealed by Pope Benedict XVI in his recently published book “John Paul II, My Beloved Predecessor”. As the Chairman of the Congregation for Edifice, Cardinal Ratzinger in 1997 advised Pope John Paul II not to go to Dylan's concert. But Wojtyla, the Pope, did not take his advice.

This disagreement between Ratzinger and Wojtyla has only now been published for the first time. Ratzinger writes that he was full of doubt, as he remains today, regarding the performances of “such kind of prophets”, as he calls Dylan, at concerts related to Church events. The two Popes had completely different views on what was being done by probably the greatest musician in the history of rock music, who unexpectedly converted to Christianity in the 1970's.

Today, after a music career spanning forty-five years and with forty-four albums behind him, he still ranks high in the world's hit charts. And through those years the music world has not had another person of such strong personal expression, pointing to social injustice and the importance of the small man in his songs.

Although the society of our time does not differ much from the times of Dylan's beginnings, the up-coming generation feels the need for a new “guide” who will lead them in protest verse towards the path of change.

In quest for a poetry with which they can identify, today's rebels often reach for a Dylan record.

Considerations about him -since his birth in Minnesota back in 1941 - whether biographical, critical or just plain fanatical, often dispute whether Dylan is a poet or a musician; an electric or acoustic guitar player; a Jew or a Christian.

Born Robert Allen Zimmerman, he started playing guitar at the age of ten and five years later he wrote his first song. The rebelliousness has been in him since his student days. The statement that he cannot stay in the same place for a long time, is evidence of the restless temper springing forth from his creative energy.

The full article can be found on pages 60-61 of Vol 2
2007 issue.