He was what...78 when he was elected...How dumb is that...
He was the right man at the right time, and accomplished more in eight years than most people do in a lifetime.
Not dumb at all. What he accomplished in eight years is incredible. His papacy was a godsend.
I was reading that the pattern has been long papacy, short papacy, long papacy, short papacy, etc.
JPII had been pope for a long time - too long, in my opinion, because he had no control at all over the Church in his final years and terrible things happened, because while his advisors had control over some things, he was still in charge and could do whatever came into his foggy mind or was suggested to him by some duplicitous person. So after him they chose somebody older who wasn’t going to hold the position for a very long time.
Speculation says that they will chose a younger person this time around, but who knows?
Although I’m not Catholic, I feel compelled to defend them against your premise that it wasn’t smart to elect someone so old. Maybe he was the right man at the time, and was able to do a lot of good until he reached a point where his health problems were too much. Benjamin Franklin did some of his best work in his seventies.
I didn’t think it was stupid. I thought it was the most wonderful gift, and a miracle that he was elected. But now I realize he was a total fraud.