Mystic Monk Padre Pio Part 2

Today part two of the infamous or the Saint Pio depending on your point of view.

Padre Pio and the Stigmata

Padre Pio bore the wounds of Jesus on his hands, feet, and side for 50 years.

Several days before he died in 1968, all evidence of the wounds disappeared.

On October 22, 1918, Padre Pio wrote to his spiritual advisor, Padre Benedetto, describing how he received the stigmata.

"On the morning of the 20th of last month, in the choir, after I had celebrated Mass, I yielded to a drowsiness similar to a sweet sleep.

All the internal and external senses and even the very faculties of my soul were immersed in indescribable stillness.

Absolute silence surrounded and invaded me.

I was suddenly filled with great peace and abandonment which effaced everything else and caused a lull in the turmoil.

All this happened in a flash.

"While this was taking place, I saw before me a mysterious person similar to the one I had seen on the evening of 5 August.

The only difference was that his hands and feet and side were dripping blood. The sight terrified me and what I felt at that moment is indescribable.

I thought I should die and really should have died if the Lord had not intervened and strengthened my heart which was about to burst out of my chest.

"The vision disappeared and I became aware that my hands, feet and side were dripping blood.
Imagine the agony I experienced and continue to experience almost every day.

The heart wound bleeds continually, especially from Thursday evening until Saturday.

Dear Father, I am dying of pain because of the wounds and the resulting embarrassment I feel in my soul.

I am afraid I shall bleed to death if the Lord does not hear my heartfelt supplication to relieve me of this condition.

Will Jesus, who is so good, grant me this grace? Will he at least free me from the embarrassment caused by these outward signs?

I will raise my voice and will not stop imploring him until in his mercy he takes away, not the wound or the pain, which is impossible since I wish to be inebriated with pain, but these outward signs which cause me such embarrassment and unbearable humiliation."

But Padre Pio was dogged during his life and even after his death by accusations that he was a fraud.

A new book last year suggested he was a self-harming man who may have used carbolic acid to create wounds in his hands mimicking those of Christ when he was nailed to the cross.

Church officials have repeatedly denied that he was a fake.

But then church officials have denied a lot of things over the years.

Hence all of the settlements they have had to pay out for their Priests' sins.

Tomorrow the final of my three-part story.