My Grandmother meets up with a Saint: An Encounter with Padre Pio



Posted: Sunday, September 20, 2009

by Michael Angelo Massa, J.D.

My Grandmother Meets Up with a Saint- literally

In the late 1940, my Italian-born grandmother, Assunta, a young mother at the time and living in southern Italy, had the rare pleasure of meeting with a true saintliterally.

Padre Pio, who has been recently canonized by Pope John Paul II and fast-tracked' to sainthood, was a parish priest at the Church of San Giovanni Rotondo in Foggia, Italy. He had been born in the tiny town of Pietrelcina, only a few miles form my grandmother's birthplace, also located in the arid hills of southern Italy. Padre Pio's reputation was gaining wide appeal. Padre Pio bore the stigmata, the wounds of Christ, on his hands and feet, and despite the Church's cautious indifference to this phenomenon at the time, thousands flocked to somehow be touched by the special man.

Padre Pio was born May 25, 1887, Pio became a priest in 1910. Within a month of his ordination, (September 7, 1910), as Padre Pio was fervently praying, Christ and the Blessed Mother appeared to the priest and gave him the wounds of Christ, the Stigmata. For Padre Pio's doctors and countrymen, the priest and mystic's wounds created much confusion, not to mention suspicion on the part of Church authorities. He asked Jesus to take away "the annoyance," adding, " I do want to suffer, even to die of suffering, but all in secret." The wounds went away and the supernatural life of Padre Pio remained a secret...only for a while and returned intermittently for over 60 years.

This was the beginning of a legacy and life of service, great personal suffering, and of producing healing miracles to those in his presence and those who invoked his prayers.

The rare pictures and portraits of Padre Pio feature him offering the Liturgy with his hands wrapped in white cloth and frequently bleeding. In 2002, Pope John Paul II elevated Padre Pio to sainthood by canonization.

In Foggia on an afternoon, the only thing separating my grandmother and this esteemed Saint was a thin confessional screen. She had traveled with her husband to Foggia in order to perhaps personally receive his blessings and penance, as did hundreds per year who journeyed to get a glimpse and even hopefully speak with him. She was fortunate and was able to receive personal penance from Padre Pio. It was a life's experience for her. She was pregnant with a son during the visit, and often told of how the man's compassion was also tempered by common sense and an instinctive ability to know peoples souls

Today, the Shrine of Padre Pio in San Giovanni Rotondo is the second most visited Christian shrine in the world, second only to St. Peter's Basilica.

To be touched by the man, even if only in spirit- is something my grandmother never forgot, and annually, traveling pilgrims continue in the rare experience of being in the presence of a Saint.

Michael A Massa, is a writer, and member of St Joan of Arc Parish in Powell, Ohio. Contact him at mmassa@columbus.rr.com

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