87. Padre Pio Unearthed
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| Padre Pio in a glass case |
Today is a special day in Italy, not because it’s a national holiday commemorating the day the Americans landed on the shores of Sicily and liberated Italy from Fascist occupation... it makes me shudder to think, if it weren’t for the Americans the whole of Europe would now be trampled under the boots of the Gestapo... Practically the same kind of life the Tibetans have to endure at the moment... No, today is a special day because Padre Pio has been unearthed, placed in a glass case and put on show for anyone to see- Oh dear, doesn’t it sound as if the body of this Saint is being treated like some kind of historical work of art!
However, this event makes a refreshing change from Darfur, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Tibet, China and the Olympics cock-up which I have delivered in the hands of Padre Pio to sort out. Being a rough, self-willed, hardly malleable saint, I’m not saying he will do as I ask, but he always listens anyway. This I do know for a fact as I have once explained in my post number 39 which I’ve decided to copy here again since Padre Pio and I go back a long way.
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| The new "offending" Church |
They Want to Move Padre Pio: Sunday 16 December 2007
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| The Cross that overlooks San Giovanni Rotondo where Padre Pio's Sanctuary is |
Voices were buzzing around on TV yesterday that they want to move Padre Pio from the tomb where he is resting in the original church of Santa Maria degli Angeli. And there was a hue and cry that the Saint should be left to rest where he is under his marble lid- and would you know it, I don’t even have a photo of that- at the precise
moment when I found myself in front of the
tomb, my camera was blocked- I knew instantly it was Padre Pio up to his old tricks again of which I shall explain herewith.
I have photos of the old church and the new ‘offending’ church, described so because no one wants Padre Pio to be moved there. I have photos of the town, that is San Giovanni Rotondo in Foggia (on the opposite side of the boot to Naples), of the hotels, of the pilgrims of the outdoor Stations of the Cross placed on a hill, a reminiscence of Cavalry, of the museum where all Padre Pio’s things are kept and the letters… among which, one, is mine.
As soon as we arrived at the square of the sanctuary, I left the rest of the pilgrims and went off on my own in search of my letter…
I can’t remember how many offices I went through nor for how long I stood in queues but I was determined to find my letter, even photograph taking took second place.
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| Pilgrims making the Stations of the Cross at the Sanctuary |
At the information desk they told me that they did not keep any of the letters at San Giovanni except the ones stacked in the glass cases in a room in the museum which where the entire number of one year, that of 1958 which was not my case since I had sent mine in August 1968 just before entering the Novitiate in Broadstairs, Kent.
Maybe I should try their newspaper’s offices, the Friar suggested, as they dealt with letters that verified Padre Pio’s authenticity in the process for Beatification.
So over I went and again waited and waited until the editor called me in.
He asked me to explain exactly what my letter was about. So I told him that I wanted to know if I had a calling to the Religious Life, “Because at that time,” I said I was disenchanted with the world and wanted to know if there was anything else?” He looked at me as if I was a housewife in a supermarket looking for a special brand of soap powder. So as not to give him the chance to dismiss me without a fair hearing I said, “But Padre Pio replied... he replied.” I repeated to make sure the concept had sunk in.
“And…” the man said impatiently.
“Padre Pio said I was going to have a tough time throughout my life… he wasn’t at all nice…”
“Was that all?”
“No… He said I had to stop seeking my own will…” I paused recalling the same words said to me by the Principal of the teacher’s training college I was attending, who herself was a nun. But she had said it with the complete opposite intention that Padre Pio had said it. I had wanted to be a teacher at the time and the Principal said I had another vocation and I should stop seeking my own will, I was not meant to be a teacher. The man kept urging me to continue.
“Padre Pio wrote I would never become a nun, that I did not have a vocation… just like that, quite straight forward. However, he told me to say a lot of prayers and seek not my own but God’s will and that after much suffering I would find what I was lookin
g for.”
“Hum…” the editor muttered.
“But that was not all… Padre Pio said to destroy that letter immediately after I had read it.”
“And did you…?”
“Of course not… How can one destroy a letter from Padre Pio… I took absolutely no notice of what he had said and put it safely in my overall pocket.” A wry smile crept across the man’s lips. “Neither did I take any notice of his advice of not becoming a nun…”
“Well what happened? Obviously you are not a nun…” I looked at him and smiled,
“It’s a long story…”
The man told me that I would have to go to the Main Monastery a few miles from there where the archives are kept to see if they can trace my letter but he suggested I give up- the enterprise would be quite a feat.
It wasn’t the news I expected, however I left without telling him that in spite of all my efforts to safeguard the letter Padre Pio had sent me, when I next put my hand inside my overall pocket- it had simply disappeared.
That’s why when I got to the
Saint’s tomb and my camera didn’t click, I knew Padre Pio was up to his old tricks again!
Back to the present: this time I did get someone to send me a photo of him!
Related articles: They Want to Move Padre Pio
