History of the papacy not only his deep inner resignation but also his constant abandonment to divine providence.". It is this character trait, which led to the opening of the process of beatification and canonization for Paul VI. With the accession of Pope John Paul II after the mysterious death of Pope John Paul I (who only survived as pope for 33 days), the church had, for the first time since Pope Adrian VI in the 16th century, a non-Italian pope. John Paul II has been credited with helping to bring down communism in eastern Europe by sparking what amounted to a peaceful revolution
Reformation Papacy or Counter Reformation within the Roman Catholic Church. Lutherans, Reformed, Anabaptists, and Methodists all included references to the Papacy as the Antichrist in their confessions of faith: Smalcald Articles, Article four (1537) Treatise on the Power and Primacy of the Pope (1537) Westminster Confession (1646) The Catholic Church did not mount an organized and deliberate response to the Protestant Reformation until the election (1534) of Pope Paul III, who placed the papacy itself at the head of a movement for churchwide reform. Pope Paul III established a reform commission, appointed several leading reformers to the College of Cardinals, initiated reform