Answer: Pope John Paul II.
Over a century ago on May 18, Karol Józef Wojtyła was born become later known as Pope John Paul II. Pope John Paul II is perhaps one of the most revered popes in recent history.
His involvement with the Catholic Church began in 1942 when he joined the seminary. He was ordained as a priest in 1946. And later in 1967, he became the Cardinal in Communist Eastern Europe. Following the death of Pope John Paul I in 1978, he was anointed to lead the Vatican Papacy. Then in 2014, nine years following his death he was canonized to Sainthood by Pope Francis.
Pope John Paul II was known for his conservative social views against abortion, contraception, and homosexual sex. Politically, he opposed communism, apartheid, capital punishment, and wars. He's remembered as the pope who spoke against the 2003 Iraq War. In his State of the World address, he said "No to war! War is not always inevitable. It is always a defeat for humanity."
Pope John Paul II has lived through some of the most tumultuous years of the 1940's World Wars, the Persian Gulf, and Iraq War in the 1990s thru early 2000. His principles and teachings embody his motto, Totus tuus ('Totally yours') as the pope that by some Catholics called "St. John Paul the Great".