A few months ago, I came home from work and switched on the TV. On the screen were two men holding a photo opportunity, one Catholic, the other Protestant - His Holiness, Pope John Paul the Second and George Walker Bush, President of the United States. The Supreme Pontiff was trying to read a written statement to the press. I strained to listen to what the old man was saying. Was it Polish, Italian, Latin even? It was only after several moments that I realised that the leader of the world's Catholics was actually speaking in English. By that stage of his life, the ravages of Parkinson's disease had rendered his voice almost incomprehensible.
Looking at those two deeply conservative men, I knew instantly which one of them that I, as an Irish Protestant, had some respect for. And it wasn't my co-religionist from Texas, that's for sure. I had my differences with the Holy Father, but I never doubted that he acted from a strong sense of right and wrong, that he was morally consistent. So while he was "pro-life" on abortion, he was also "pro-life" when it came to opposing unnecessary wars.
Like many people, I am too young to remember any other Pope, and thus not old enough to recall any other Papal death. What is the non-Catholic etiquette in this situation? How much regret or sorrow is it appropriate to express? Speaking frankly, the Pope was not a hero figure for me. His death does not move me in the way that Nelson Mandela's passing (hopefully far off) most certainly will. But if my Catholic friends and family feel a sense of loss today, and some of them I suspect will not, then I'm sorry for their grief.
For me, as an Irish Protestant, there is also the problem of how frank one should be in assessing the Pope's life at the time of his passing. I have "issues" to put it mildly with some of the Holy Father's views, but is it really right for me to express these openly? I am supremely conscious that mine is the only country in the world where simply being a Catholic can, in some circumstances, be a death sentence. In such a context, one needs to tread very cautiously indeed when discussing religion.
My maternal grandfather, who died before I was born, liked to say "there's a difference between being anti-Catholic and being anti-Catholicism". Tommy, a fairly religious man, was against the concept of Catholicism, but not in any way against Catholics as people. It seems to me that he was correct to draw the distinction, that theological opposition to another denomination does not have to go hand in hand with sectarian hatred.
But still, I feel reticent about voicing my view of this Pope, lest my comments be misunderstood as promoting the type of bigotry which is still such a virulent cancer in Ireland. The wounds of the conflict in the North are still too raw to allow for a frank discussion of religious difference between Protestant and Catholic. I remember Greysteel and Loughinisland only too well. The sickness in my community which led to these barabaric acts is still present.
John Paul the Second's Papacy was one of the longest in the history of the Catholic church. If the next Pope serves as long as the man from Krakow then hopefully, at the time of his death, I will be able to say honestly what I thought of him.
But not this time round.