St John Paul Ii, We Love You - Totus2us

Clare, from Ireland: "I went to see Pope John Paul II in Galway in 1979, just the summer before I went away to university, We travelled down on a battered old bus from Belfast and it was a bit of a scary journey and we slept overnight in a factory on the floor in sleeping bags and then we made a night-time vigil across to Ballybrit racecourse in Galway. Everybody from the north of Ireland was in the stand and we waited a long time watching, anticipating, waiting to see a helicopter arrive. Then when Pope John Paul arrived, he got out of the helicopter, he got down on the ground and kissed the floor. And then he said 'young people of Ireland, let's hope that you bring peace.' I have to say at the time the troubles were pretty much at their height and it was an extremely moving occasion and something I've never forgotten for the rest of my life. I think one of the things that was most important about it was that he recognised the effort that had been made by a lot of the young people to come down from the north