Pope John Paul II (May 18, 1920 – April 2, 2005)

I watched Cash Peters’ YouTube video featuring Pope John Paul II. It was eye-opening for me because, even though I lived through the whole of his Papacy (1978-2005), I hadn’t really known his life story. That spurred me to looking at his birth chart.

Most astrology sites list this birth time as ‘excellent’, and it was the same time that my Kepler 7.0 program had already, so I’ve let it be. First thing to notice is that Libra Mars/Ascendant conjunction. They say he was accident-prone in his youth, so this may be the reason for that condition. At any rate, as Mars is in the 12th House, it may have made him impulsive in his actions.

There are two inconjuncts, both dependent on an accurate birth time.

Sun Inconjunct Ascendant

Your relations with other people can be very intense. While you are young, they may be quite difficult, because you feel that others will accept you only if you deny yourself in some way. Or you may constantly feel you should put off doing what you want in order to do what you have to do. Usually your ideas about what you have to do come from the people around you. Also, contacts with other people will frequently force you to make serious, major psychological changes. Difficulties in your relationships with friends and family are signs of profound internal changes.

You may find that no mater how hard you try to show others who you really are, they misunderstand you somehow. This is because the angular relationship between your rising sign and Sun sign indicates tha your internal energies are quite different from the energies that you show to the world. You are not intentionally dishonest with the world, you simply present a confusing complex of energies. As you get older, you will learn more about your effect on people, which will enable you to put the two sides of your personality together so that they work smoothly. Be patient and do not hurry. Look a each relationship as an opportunity to learn more about yourself through your effects upon others. You will know you have learned this when you no longer attract people who are psychologically difficult to deal with.

(The Nazi war machine in Poland comes to mind.)

Uranus Inconjunct Midheaven

You need to express your thoughts and feelings, but you often upset the people around you with your words. You seem to enjoy creating a stir every time you say something, but this can get you into quite a bit of trouble with parents, teachers and other authority figures. The underlying principle of this aspect is the need to balance your individual self-expression and manner of communicating with your need to learn and grow under the guidance of older people.

When you feel rebellious and unwilling to accept anything you are told, you should be allowed, within reason, to have the experience that will help you understand your elders’ point of view. If you are lucky enough to have parents who let you do this, you will eventually get over your childhood resentment of being told what to do. Although you may not always agree with what they tell you, at least you will consider the merits of their ideas.

(Being Pope meant he had to listen to the Cardinals and other Roman Catholic Church officials.)

Conclusion

The one surprising element of the Soul Crossings’ video was that before Pope John Paul II entered the dome of light at the end of the tunnel, he stepped away from the spotlight, and became Karol Wojtyla again. Then as this humble persona, he entered the light dome through a curtain in the back. That’s a great symbol of his return to his beginnings: he took the servants’ entrance to the afterlife.