Historian: Reagan had a surprising best friend

Author Paul Kengor talked about his new book on President Ronald Reagan and his relationship with Pope John Paul II on Wednesday’s “The Glenn Beck Radio Program.”

“A Pope and a President: John Paul II, Ronald Reagan, and the Extraordinary Untold Story of the 20th Century” explores the relationship between the two leaders and their shared mission: fighting the spread of communism. The book has the previously untold story of the deep bond between Reagan and Pope John Paull II, whom First Lady Nancy Reagan called her husband’s “closest friend.”

Reagan wanted to meet the pope before he was even elected president and knew that he needed to be elected and work with Pope John Paul II to fight Soviet communism, Kengor explained. He described the pope and the president as “men of destiny” who each saw surviving an assassination attempt against them as evidence of God’s protection.

They saw their mission as a “historical, spiritual struggle to take down a deceit, this evil empire, atheistic Soviet Communism,” Kengor said. “Reagan felt that there was no better friend, no closer friend that he had in that endeavor than Pope John Paul II.”

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