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Padre Pio of Pietrelcina
This is a photograph of the incorruptible body of Padre Pio exhumed on March 2, 2008, 40 years after his death on September 23, 1968. His remains was shown to the public in the Shrine of Holy Mary of Grace, Madonna delle Grazie Church in San Giovanni Rotondo, Foggia province, Italy, from April 24, 2008 to September 2009. Padre Pio was a Franciscan Capuchin Catholic priest who bore the five wounds of Jesus Christ on his body visibly for more than fifty years. He was also a seer, mind-reader, prophet, miracle-worker, confessor, mystic, ascetic, and a missionary on a world-wide scale.
There have only been about 60 accepted cases of the stigmata in the Catholic Church’s history. Padre Pio was the first and only ordained Roman Catholic priest in the Church's history who has received the visible stigmata. According to medical science, his loss of blood over the years was so great that he could not have survived for very long – certainly not fifty years.
There have only been about 60 accepted cases of the stigmata in the Catholic Church’s history. Padre Pio was the first and only ordained Roman Catholic priest in the Church's history who has received the visible stigmata. According to medical science, his loss of blood over the years was so great that he could not have survived for very long – certainly not fifty years.
Padre Pio had wounds on the hands and feet, on the left side of the chest, and on the right shoulder were Jesus carried the Cross. He also had transverberation of the heart, wounds from scourging, and an invisible crown of thorns. All were very painful.
Padre Pio actually received the stigmata on August 14, 1910. According to Padre Pio's correspondence, even early in his priesthood he experienced less obvious indications of the visible stigmata for which he would later become famous. In a 1911 letter to his spiritual director, Padre Benedetto from San Marco in Lamis, Padre Pio described something he had been experiencing for a year:
Padre Pio actually received the stigmata on August 14, 1910. According to Padre Pio's correspondence, even early in his priesthood he experienced less obvious indications of the visible stigmata for which he would later become famous. In a 1911 letter to his spiritual director, Padre Benedetto from San Marco in Lamis, Padre Pio described something he had been experiencing for a year:
"Then last night something happened which I can neither explain nor understand. In the middle of the palms of my hands a red mark appeared, about the size of a penny, accompanied by acute pain in the middle of the red marks. The pain was more pronounced in the middle of the left hand, so much so that I can still feel it. Also under my feet I can feel some pain."
His close friend Father Agostino wrote to him in 1915, asking when he first experienced visions, whether he had been granted the stigmata, or felt the pains of the Passion of Christ - the crowning of thorns and the scourging. Padre Pio replied that he had been favoured with visions since his novitiate period (1903 to 1904). He wrote that although he had been granted the stigmata, he had been so terrified by the phenomenon he begged the Lord to withdraw only the visible wounds but not the pain since at the time he considered them to be an indescribable and almost unbearable humiliation. The visible wounds disappeared at that point, but reappeared in September 1918. He reported, however, that the pain remained and was more acute on specific days and under certain circumstances. He also admitted experiencing the pain of the crown of thorns and the scourging. He was not able to clearly indicate the frequency of this experience, but said that he had been suffering from them at least once weekly for some years.
On July 1918, while World War I was still going on, Pope Benedict XV, who had termed the World War "the suicide of Europe," appealed to all Christians urging them to pray for an end of the war. On 27 July of the same year, Padre Pio offered himself as a victim for the end of the war. Days passed and between August 5 and 7, Padre Pio had a vision in which Christ appeared and pierced his side. This occurrence is considered as a "transverberation" or piercing of the heart indicating the union of love with God.
In a letter to Father Benedetto on August 21, 1918, Padre Pio writes of his experiences during the transverberation:
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