I just happened on this news article about Pope John Paul the Great:
Warsaw - Pope John Paul II had such a passion for skiing that he carried on hitting the slopes — incognito — even after becoming pontiff, according to a memoir by his personal secretary Stanislaw Dziwisz.
In "A Life with Karol," which was published on Monday in the late pope’s native Poland, Dziwisz recounted a ruse used by John Paul II in January 1981 to give his guards the slip and head for a resort in Italy’s Abruzzi region.
"We left at nine in the morning, in Father Jozef’s car, so that the Swiss Guards wouldn’t get suspicous," wrote Dziwisz, referring to Archbishop Jozef Kowalczyk, who is today the the papal nuncio, or representative of the Vatican, in Poland.
As the vehicle left the pope’s residence at Castel Gandolfo, another Polish priest in the passenger seat "pretended to read a newspaper in order to hide the Holy Father," who was sitting in the back of the car with Dziwisz.
Once they reached the ski resort of Ovindoli, the pope acted "like just another ordinary skier," wrote Dziwisz.
source.
I find it amusing that this leader of the world's billion Catholics, an adult man in his sixties, has to sneak off like some teenager to go off and ski.
If the pope wants to ski, he should damn well go skiing, period! Not sneak around like some teen.
