In our home, last night we said a rosary in honor of the pope, with our littlest, still only three, mouthing the words as best she could. Absent the inspiration we drew from John Paul II, I found myself wondering, would my wife and I had the courage to produce what is, by contemporary standards (and by the standards with which I was raised), a big family?

The children may have been puzzled about the tears in their father’s eyes, but

as we asked Our Lady to welcome Karol Wojtyla to heaven, I realized that in some sense I owe him their very existence.