Pope's Museum Is a Shrine to the Soul

WASHINGTON, March 19 -- Shake hands with Karol Wojtyla.

The man known as Pope John Paul II has the calloused, creviced palm of a laborer. Yet his fingers are narrow, delicate as a poet's.

Press a hand to a life-size bronze relief of his and wonder at its mix of earthiness and holiness. It's the pope's most personal touch at the $65 million center bearing his name, which opens Friday.

But the Pope John Paul II Cultural Center is not a museum to a man.

The pope made it clear in 1988, when Cardinal Adam Maida, now Archbishop of Detroit, first suggested a museum to honor his global embrace: John Paul would bless only a more universal idea -- a museum about timeless faith.

The result is a critically acclaimed building on a hill west of Catholic University in which architect Leo Daly conveys the ineffable concept of a soul in a body by infusing limestone and copper forms with natural light. Pools of water lend vitality. The design firm of Edwin Schlossberg, in concert with the Vatican and American Catholic religious and lay leadership, has created a tangible experience of Catholic concepts of God, community, hope and wonder.

Of course, there are the traditional treats of a 21st century museum: a gift shop with monk-made fudge, affordable handicrafts and international antiques; a spacious cafe; and one small gallery devoted to this particular pope. A guaranteed hot spot: the modest Polish Heritage gallery displaying his skis along with photos of him as a dynamic young priest and a world-traveling pope.

Visitors can move up to the next floor by wide ramps lined with casts of hands from ordinary people who have met the pope. Images of the human family in all races and ages glow from photos engraved on opaque glass walls. Paintings of Mary in every cultural expression hang overhead. It's a way of walking through the world that is at once particularly Catholic and universal, says the director, the Rev. Michael Bugarin.

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