Posted on 12/08/2005 2:24:03 PM PST by lizol
John Paul childhood home for sale
From correspondents in Warsaw December 09, 2005
THE house in southern Poland where the late pope John Paul II was born has been put on the market for $US1 million ($1.34 million) by its American Jewish owner, a press report said today.
According to the Gazeta Wyborcza, the episcopate of Krakow is interested in buying the house in the nearby town of Wadowice, but finds the asking price prohibitive.
"Talks are underway. There is a lot of goodwill on the part of all involved parties, including the Jewish community," Father Robert Necek of the Krakow episcopate - where the future pope presided for the 15 years before his papacy began in 1978 - said.
The house in Wadowice where John Paul II was born Karol Wojtyla on May 18, 1920, currently belongs to US-based Ron Balamuth, who inherited the property from his Polish-Jewish family.
Now the Museum of the Holy Father Family House, it attracts some 5000 visitors a day to see its collection of objects belonging to Wojtyla and his family, and from John Paul II's papacy.
Poland's Jewish community - once the biggest in Europe but obliterated by Nazi Germany during World War II - is looking into the possibility of buying the house and then donating it to the town of Wadowice.
"It would be a magnanimous gesture on our part, to thank this apostle of reconciliation between Catholics and Jews," the head of Krakow's Jewish community, Tadeusz Jakubowicz, who came up with the idea of buying the house, said.
"I don't think the asking price is exorbitant, and my fear is that someone motivated by financial gain might buy the house and then sell it on at a higher price," Mr Jakubowicz said.
The current archbishop of Krakow, John Paul II's former personal secretary Stanislaw Dziwisz, "has already sought my opinion on the asking price" for the house, Mr Jakubowicz said.
A spokesman for Wadowice town hall, Stanislaw Kotarba, said: "Everyone agrees that the John Paul II museum must remain in the house in which he was born."
Visitors to the museum can see kitchen utensils used by the young Wojtyla's mother, Emilia, a few pieces of furniture and skis and other sports equipment that he used during his athletic youth.
In one room, three vestments Wojtyla wore in the different stages of his life as a man of the cloth are exhibited: a priest's robe, then that of a cardinal, and the robe he wore immediately after his 1978 surprise election as pope.
The walls of the house-turned-museum are hung with dozens of photographs depicting the life of the pope, with one room dedicated exclusively to his childhood.
Wonder who the American Jewish owner is and when he bought it..
I hope they can work this out.
He inherited it.
He didn't buy It. The chosen people don't have to pay.
"The house in Wadowice where John Paul II was born Karol Wojtyla on May 18, 1920, currently belongs to US-based Ron Balamuth, who inherited the property from his Polish-Jewish family."
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