an incense of prayer that burned day and night without ceasing. He has been called the “greatest mystic of our century” and became the first priest in history to receive the stigmata.  

Francesco Forgione was born in southern Italy on May 25, 1887. At just five years old, he decided to give his life to God and follow in the footsteps of his namesake, Saint Francis of Assisi. He joined the Capuchin Friars at age 15 and was ordained a priest at age twenty-three, serving at the friary of San Giovanni Rotondo for most of his life.

On September 20, 1918, while making his thanksgiving after Mass, Padre Pio fell into a trance. He saw a vision of Jesus on the cross, dripping blood. When the vision ended, he realized his own hands and feet were pierced and he, too, was dripping blood. The five wounds of Christ remained on his body for the next fifty years.

After news of his stigmata spread, people flocked to the friary. Padre Pio’s days began at 2:30 a.m. as he prayed in preparation for his daily 5:00 a.m. Mass. As time went on, he also heard confessions after Mass for twelve to eighteen hours every day. Padre Pio was also given the spiritual gifts of prophecy, bilocation, and speaking perfectly in languages he never studied. 

He could also read people’s hearts, knowing details of their lives they had never spoken to him. Once, he gave a woman an unexpected penance of going home to look into the well in her garden. She followed Pio’s orders and upon looking into the well, she saw the face of her own son whom she had aborted several years prior. 

Padre Pio took up to two hours to celebrate mass. An eye witness once said, “God in his love and mercy had given us this man of suffering in our lifetime to reenact before our eyes, the mystery of our salvation.” 

Saint Padre Pio died at eighty-one years old. He continued to say, “Jesu Maria”, over and over again until his final breath. His dead body showed no trace of the wounds he carried for fifty years. 

He was canonized in Rome in 2002 in the presence of 300,000 people who knew this man truly followed the will of God “on earth as it is in heaven.”