VATICAN CITY - Pope John Paul II considered resigning five years ago, according to his final testament released Thursday by the Vatican, and also thought about being buried in his native Poland.
"I hope that He will help me to recognize how long I must continue this service," the testament reads. "May the mercy of God give me the necessary strength for this service."
The document also reveals that John Paul II considered being buried in Poland but finally decided to leave the decision up to the College of Cardinals.
He thanked "divine providence" that the Cold War confrontation between East and West had ended without "violent nuclear conflict."
"In the autumn of the year 1989 the previously tense situation which marked the 1980s changed, (removing) the danger which weighed on the world in the previous period."
John Paul II, who died on Saturday and will be buried Friday after a requiem mass to be celebrated by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger in Saint Peter's Square, wrote the document in six phases, starting in 1979 -- the first full year of his papacy -- and ending in 2000.
It begins: "Be vigilant, because you do not know the day our Lord will come."
Again, in a series of reflections dated February-March 1980, he writes: "Today, I want to add only this, that everyone must be aware of the prospect of death."
The pope left no personal property, instructing his Polish private secretary, Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz, to burn all his personal notes.
In his first segment written in 1979, he also thanked Dziwisz -- one of the few living individuals cited in the will -- "for such understanding, help and cooperation over so many years."
Dziwisz was holding John Paul II's hand when he died.
The late pope also praises Catholic bishops worldwide as well as members of other faiths.
"How can I not embrace with thankful memory all the bishops of the world" he said. "How can I not remember also many Christian brothers -- non-Catholics! And the Rabbi of Rome, so many representatives of non-Christian religions!"
The last entry, written in 2000, shows he recognized that he was approaching the end of his life.
"I go back in my memory to the beginning, to my parents, my brother and my sister, whom I didn't know because she died before I was born."
He recalled "the parish of Wadowice where I was baptized, ... neighbors, friends and friends from elementary school, from the gymnasium, from the university up to the time of the occupation when I worked as a labourer and later in the parish of Niegowi and that of the San Floriano parish in Krakow."
He thought back "to Krakow and Rome ... to the people who in a special way entrusted me to the Lord."
The pope said he left the Church and the world in the hands of Mother of God, the Virgin Mary, whom he also thanks for a "miraculous" escape from death when he was hit by a would-be assassin's bullets in St Peter's Square in May 1981.
"I thank everyone. I ask forgiveness from everyone," the pope wrote.
04/07/2005 14:26 GMT