One of the outstanding characteristics of Padre
Pio’s(Francesco Forgione’s) spirituality was his deep devotion to Mary.
His love for the Blessed Mother was one which was present from his
earliest years and which lasted through his whole life. In the small
town of Pietrelcina where he was born, devotion to the Madonna has been
a characteristic of the people’s spirituality for many centuries. Our
Lady Liberatrix (Our Lady of Liberty) was the special patroness of the
area and was venerated in the main church. Every year there was a
festival in her honor with a procession through the streets.
The Forgiones were an extremely devout family. When the
church bells rang every morning the family gathered for morning prayers.
They went to church every day and prayed the Rosary together as a family
every evening. Prayer came before all other activities in the household.
Maria Giuseppa, Padre Pio’s mother, also had a great devotion to Our
Lady of Mount Carmel.
Padre Pio was 14 years old when he visited the shrine in
Pompeii dedicated to Our Lady. Our Lady of Pompeii was especially dear
to his heart and often when he needed a special grace for himself or for
someone else, he would ask his friends to pray to Our Lady of Pompeii
for his intentions. He wrote, “I should like to ask you, if it is not
inconvenient, to do me the kindness of making three consecutive novenas
to the Virgin of Pompeii for a grace to be obtained for me from her Son,
a grace which will mean a great deal for a certain soul.” On another
occasion he wrote, “I thank you for the novenas you made for me to Our
Lady of Pompeii and I would ask you if it is not inconvenient, to
continue because I am in great need.”
In his letters to his spiritual directors, Padre Pio
called the Blessed Mother, “beautiful Virgin Mary,” “most tender mother
of priests,” “Mediatrix of all graces.” In Our Lady, he saw the advocate
of sinners, the most beloved, the consoler. He frequently referred to
Mary simply as “Mother.” Reciting the Angelus he rarely managed to
restrain his emotions and when he spoke about her it was not unusual for
him to shed tears.
The Sorrowful Virgin was another attribute of Mary that
was close to his heart. He loved to contemplate her at the foot of the
cross. To his spiritual children he would say, “Go and keep company with
Jesus in His Passion, and with His Sorrowful Mother.”
From the day on which he became a priest he always
preferred to say Mass at Our Lady’s altar. The Mass he celebrated most
frequently was the Mass of the Immaculate Conception. “The Immaculate
Conception,” he said, “is the first step on the path of salvation.”
To a spiritual daughter who asked him for a thought on
the Madonna, he said, “My daughter, it is enough for you to know that
Mary is the Mother of Jesus. . .She loves us so much that she offered to
God the Father His only natural Son to save His adopted sons. . .She is
a great and inestimable treasure who encloses in herself an infinite
treasure, the Son of God.”
Padre Pio used to speak of being inundated with graces by
her. “She treats me as if I were her only child on the face of the
earth,” he wrote. He spoke of the tenderness of Our Lady who accompanied
him to the altar. “What care she took to accompany me to the altar this
morning. It seemed to me that she has nothing else to think about except
myself as she filled my whole heart with sentiments of holy love.”
Padre Eusebio Notte, personal assistant to Padre Pio,
once said to him, “You see Our Lady, don’t you?” He answered, “She comes
to me whenever I need her.” He also said that she remained beside him
when he heard confessions. “Her loving care toward me cannot be
described in words,” he said.
Padre Pio’s love for Mary was evident as he prayed the
Rosary whenever there was a free moment in his busy day and when there
were no free moments, he found a way to pray even then. He preferred the
Rosary above all other prayers and asked his spiritual children to carry
a Rosary with them at all times and to pray it every day. For him the
Rosary represented the continual meditation on the profound mysteries of
God’s designs for salvation.
Padre Pio said so many rosaries in one day that the
number was unbelievable, although he had a special grace for doing this.
His spirit of prayer made what seemed impossible, within his reach. “The
Lord asks this of me; He does not ask the same of you,” he said. Once
someone asked him how he was able to pray so many rosaries. “You can do
one thing at a time,” he replied, but I can do three or four.”
Padre Pio said to one of the friars, “My son, if we do
what we have always done, what our fathers did before us, we cannot go
wrong. Satan wants to destroy this prayer, but in this he will never
succeed. The Rosary is the prayer of those who triumph over everything
and everyone. It was Our Lady who taught us this prayer, just as it was
Jesus who taught us the Our Father.” Padre Pio defined the Rosary as
“The synthesis of our faith, the expression of our charity, and the
foundation of our hope.”
Daniel Hickey, from St. Albans, New York, was an American
G.I. stationed in Italy during World War II when he met Padre Pio. When
he returned to the U.S., Danny entered the seminary and became a
Capuchin priest. Recalling his visits with Padre Pio he wrote, “Padre
Pio was usually seen standing with his right hand in the front fold
pocket of his Capuchin habit. A few times when he withdrew his hand, he
was seen to be fingering a small chaplet of beads. It seems it was Padre
Pio’s habit not to waste a second but to fill each one with a prayer.
Any lull in the conversation, no matter how short, his lips would be
seen to move slightly as he prayed. But there was nothing ostentatious
in all this; it was a long time before I was aware of what he was doing,
though I had noticed his hand constantly in the breast pocket of his
habit.”
Father Alessio Parente said, “I was at his side for six
years, and in all that time I never saw him without the Rosary in his
hands night and day. Our Lady never refused him anything through the
Rosary. The Rosary was his constant link with Our Lady.
Not only did Padre Pio have a profound devotion to the
Mother of God, but he also seemed to know the dispositions of her heart.
An image of the Madonna was found to be weeping in one of the parish
churches in Italy. The bishop of the diocese asked for an investigation
into the matter, and after much study the bishop declared it to be
authentic. When Padre Pio was told about this he said, “When Our Lady is
weeping, things are not going well.”
Bill Martin(who later became Father Joseph Pius Martin)
from Brooklyn, New York, first met Padre Pio in 1959. It was during his
second visit in 1964 that he found it very hard to leave. As he was
waiting for the bus to take him to Foggia, to his great relief a friar
came running to tell him that Padre Pio had sent him to say that he
wanted Bill to stay. He entered the friary as a 3rd order Franciscan and
was known to everyone as Brother Bill. He became Padre Pio’s personal
assistant. One afternoon as he was sitting next to Padre Pio on the
balcony near Padre Pio’s cell, he was thinking to himself how very
fortunate he was that he had been able to be so close to Padre Pio
through the years. He wondered to himself who had obtained this
marvelous grace for him. No words passed between the two but at the
moment that Brother Bill was thinking those thoughts Padre Pio turned to
him and said, “It was Our Lady.”
The Virgin Mary, ever close to Padre Pio, assisted him in
a special way regarding the state of his health. Although Padre Pio
suffered from poor health his entire life he did not become discouraged.
He offered all of his sufferings to the Lord for the conversion of
sinners and for the souls in purgatory. He said that God had “put the
problem of my health and a victorious outcome into the hands of our
heavenly Mother.” Once when he was ill, he confided to his Superior,
“What made me suffer more than anything was not being able to say even
one Ave Maria.”
Not only was the Virgin present to Padre Pio in times of
physical infirmity but in times of interior trials and spiritual
suffering as well. On August 15, 1929 on the Feast of the Assumption,
Padre Pio described an experience of Our Lady while he was celebrating
Mass. “This morning I went up to the holy altar I know not how. Physical
pain and interior grief competed as to which could most afflict all my
poor being... A mortal sadness pervaded me through and through and I
thought that all was finished for me.... At the moment of consuming the
Sacred Species of the Host, a sudden light flooded through me and I
clearly saw the Heavenly Mother with the Christ Child in her arms who
together said to me, “Stop worrying! We are with you, you belong to Us
and We are yours.”
Pio testifies to the Virgin Mary’s help in a number of
letters to his spiritual directors. On May 26, 1910 he wrote to Father
Benedetto, “My only regret, dear Father, is that I have no adequate
means with which to thank the Blessed Virgin Mary, through whose
intercession I have undoubtedly received so much strength from the Lord,
to bear with sincere resignation the many humiliations to which I am
subjected day after day...and I do not believe this strength comes to me
from the world.”
There were always crowds of people around Padre Pio,
especially the sick, trying to get close to him and to touch him. To the
sick and the suffering who implored his help, the Padre would say,
“Entrust yourself to Our Lady.” He would often say, “Let us pray to Our
Lady that she snatch this grace for you from the Heart of Jesus.”And for
those who came to him with especially difficult personal problems,
family problems, etc. he would often say, “Here we need the Madonna.”
Cleonice Morcaldi, one of Padre Pio’s spiritual
daughters, spoke to Padre Pio on September 20th, just three days before
he died. “Father, give me at least one word,” she said to him. “Love the
Madonna and make her loved. Always recite her Rosary. That is an armor
against the evils of the world today.” Cleonice asked him, “Is the
Madonna close to you?” “A Mother...” he replied. “All of paradise is
near her.”
Padre Pio died on September 23, 1968. Padre Pelegrino
Funicelli, his brother in religion, assisted him in his last moments on
earth. He said that a short time before Padre Pio’s death and with great
tenderness, Padre Pio gazed at a picture of Our Lady Liberatrix that was
hanging in his cell. He passed into eternal life peacefully, gently. He
died with his Rosary. His last words were Gésu, Maria, – Jesus, Mary
which he repeated over and over until he breathed his last.
Queen of the Most Holy Rosary, pray for us. Gate of
Heaven, pray for us.
Padre Pio’s Words of Faith
“Reflect upon and keep before your mental gaze the great
humility of the Mother of God, our Mother.”
“In my greatest sufferings it seems to me that I no
longer have a mother on this earth, but a very compassionate one in
Heaven.”
“Recommend me to the Lord and to the Virgin Mother
because I am in extreme need of their help.”
“I feel myself held fast and bound to the Son by means of
this Mother.”
“The greatest sign of love you can show me will be
precisely this, that you too thank our Blessed Lady.”
Saint Padre Pio,
pray for us!
