India, April 20 -- The Pope is not only the leader of Catholic Christians. His appeal cuts across denominations and reaches a broad cross-section of Christians worldwide. My grandfather, an Orthodox Syrian Christian from Ranny in Kerala, understood this instinctively.

In 1964, he travelled all the way to Bombay to see Pope Paul VI, the first pontiff to visit India. It was the first time he boarded a train. For years afterwards, he would regale us children with vivid stories-how close he managed to get to the Holy Father, and how tens of thousands had gathered from across the subcontinent, drawn by the magnetic pull of the man they believed sat on the throne of Saint Peter.

There was something in my grandfather's voice when he told those...