Speaker 1: Welcome to Unexplained Extra with me Richard McClane Smith, where
Speaker 1: for the weeks in between episodes, we look at stories
Speaker 1: and ideas that, for one reason or other, didn't make
Speaker 1: it into the previous show. In last week's episode, Tears
Speaker 1: Idle Tears, we heard the strange tale of the Immaculate
Speaker 1: Heart of Mary sculpture, which some believe cried real tears
Speaker 1: over the course of four intense days in the town
Speaker 1: of Syracusa in Sicily in nineteen fifty three. Throughout the years,
Speaker 1: many have claimed to witness similar religious artifacts engaged in
Speaker 1: equally miraculous behavior, to the point where it might almost
Speaker 1: seem commonplace. The Weeping Madonna of Syracusa, however, remains the
Speaker 1: only such artifact to formally recognized by the Catholic Church.
Speaker 1: In terms of the genre we might call the strange
Speaker 1: and unexplained. With regards to stories that have a particularly
Speaker 1: religious angle, I find tales of crying inanimate objects to
Speaker 1: be at the more interesting end of the scale. But
Speaker 1: if we're looking for something a little more shocking, few
Speaker 1: apparent miraculous occurrences can compare to the claimed phenomena of stigmata.
Speaker 1: For something so well known it's interesting that apparent cases
Speaker 1: of stigmata, the sudden appearance of wounds on an individual
Speaker 1: mimicking those that are said to have been endured by
Speaker 1: Jesus Christ during his alleged crucifixion, are in fact few
Speaker 1: and far between. It is said that Saint Francis of
Speaker 1: Assisi was the first person to endure such a thing,
Speaker 1: having apparently been marked by the stigmata at the end
Speaker 1: of a forty day fast he conducted in the year
Speaker 1: twelve twenty four. Since then, only about thirty or so
Speaker 1: people have seriously claimed to have suffered from it, and
Speaker 1: perhaps the most famous of them all was a man
Speaker 1: born into a humble farming family in eighteen eighty seven.
Speaker 1: His name was Francesco for Joni, or as he would
Speaker 1: later be known, Padre Pio. One morning in May nineteen
Speaker 1: twenty one, a letter sent from the Holy Office of
Speaker 1: the Vatican arrived at the episcopal residence of newly installed
Speaker 1: Bishop of Voltaire RAPHAELI Rossi. The Holy Office, formerly known
Speaker 1: as the Roman Inquisition, was the department of the Catholic
Speaker 1: Church tasked with, among other things, preserving Catholic doctrine and
Speaker 1: assessing accusations against members of the clergy to determine whether
Speaker 1: they should face disciplinary action or not, and it was
Speaker 1: regarding this latter responsibility that the forty four year old
Speaker 1: Bishop Rossi had been contacted. As the letter went on
Speaker 1: to explain, it had come to the Vatican's attention that
Speaker 1: Capuchin priest Padre Pio, who resided at Our Lady of
Speaker 1: Grace Friary in San Giovanni Rotondo in Foggia, southern Italy,
Speaker 1: was claiming to be suffering from stigmata. These stigmata wounds
Speaker 1: were so substantial that you could see right through them.
Speaker 1: It was all said to have started back in nineteen eighteen,
Speaker 1: and as word had grown about the apparent miracle, large
Speaker 1: numbers of religious devotees had begun flocking to Padre Pio's
Speaker 1: town to hear him talk and conduct confession with him.
Speaker 1: Since then, the church had received a number of complaints
Speaker 1: from Po's colleagues, accusing him of fabricating the whole thing.
Speaker 1: To his supporters, Po was also a mystic who had
Speaker 1: the power of healing, and also by location, the supposed
Speaker 1: ability to be in two places at the same time.
Speaker 1: With things threatening to get out of hand, the church
Speaker 1: had no option but to conduct a formal investigation of
Speaker 1: the apparent miracle, and it would fall to Bishop Rossi
Speaker 1: to carry out the arduous task. Arrived at the Friary
Speaker 1: in San Giovannia, Rotondo on June fourteenth, nineteen twenty one,
Speaker 1: and asked immediately to meet with Padre po. As he
Speaker 1: later noted, Rossi's first impressions of Po were that he
Speaker 1: was extremely pale, with a slight suffering disposition, but was
Speaker 1: none the less sweet and solemn, with an expression of
Speaker 1: goodness and sincerity in his face. His hands he kept
Speaker 1: hidden under a pair of fingerless gloves. Over the next
Speaker 1: few days, Brosci conducted a series of interviews with Pio
Speaker 1: and slowly began to piece together the story of his life.
Speaker 1: Padre Pio was born Francesco for Joni in the city
Speaker 1: of Pietro China in southern Italy in May eighteen eighty seven,
Speaker 1: as one of eight children. Pio said that from the
Speaker 1: age of five he experienced terrifying visions of God and
Speaker 1: the devil, and decided soon after to dedicate his life
Speaker 1: to God. Through the teachings of Saint Francis of Assisi.
Speaker 1: To that end, despite no formal schooling In nineteen o three,
Speaker 1: at the age of fifteen, he joined the Capuchin Order
Speaker 1: of Monks, an offshoot of the better known Franciscan Order,
Speaker 1: who believed their way of life better reflects the austerity
Speaker 1: and simplicity that Saint Francis had originally envisaged. After seven
Speaker 1: years of dedication to the order, Pio was ordained as
Speaker 1: a priest, and four days after that, according to him,
Speaker 1: was when the first marks of stigmatyr appeared on his body.
Speaker 1: They appeared first as a single spot on the palm
Speaker 1: of his hand that throbb'd with pain beforefore other marks emerged,
Speaker 1: first on his other hand, then his feet, and finally
Speaker 1: on the left side of his chest, the place where
Speaker 1: Jesus Christ was said to have been stabbed by a
Speaker 1: spear after his death on the cross. Although the marks
Speaker 1: eventually disappeared, the pain did not. As Padre Pio insisted
Speaker 1: to Bishop Rossy, he was so embarroedt to be blessed
Speaker 1: by such an occurrence that he first decided to try
Speaker 1: and keep it all a secret, But then the marks
Speaker 1: came back. With the outbreak of World War One, Patre
Speaker 1: Pio was conscripted into the army, but eventually discharged due
Speaker 1: to the ill health he'd suffered most of his life,
Speaker 1: mainly from a persistent bronchitis and kidney trouble. Then, in
Speaker 1: nineteen eighteen, Pope Benedict the fifteenth encouraged people to pray
Speaker 1: for an end to the war, and so, as Padre
Speaker 1: Pio explained to Bishop Rossi as he tugged herself consciously
Speaker 1: at his fingerless gloves, he did except not only did
Speaker 1: he pray, but he offered himself up as a sacrifice too.
Speaker 1: A few days later, after celebrating mass, Pio was singing
Speaker 1: with a quire when he had a vision. A near
Speaker 1: naked man was stood before him, with his arms stretched
Speaker 1: out wide as though he were being crucified, and his hands, feet,
Speaker 1: and side dripping with blood. It was unmistakably Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: As Po stared on in amazement, the vision of Christ
Speaker 1: asked him to share in his pain and join him
Speaker 1: in his unyielding concern for the salvation of others, and
Speaker 1: Padre Pio agreed. When the vision ended, Po felt a
Speaker 1: pain in his hands and saw that his palms were
Speaker 1: dripping with blood. Then he felt the pain in his
Speaker 1: feet and sighed too, and saw that they also were bleeding.
Speaker 1: From that day forward, he said the wounds had not healed.
Speaker 1: At Bishop Rossi's request, Padre Po then pulled back one
Speaker 1: of his fingerless gloves. As Rossi recorded later, the priest
Speaker 1: appeared to be in some pain as he revealed the
Speaker 1: strange wound underneath a scab roughly two centimeters a cross
Speaker 1: that seemed to cling to the material of the glove
Speaker 1: as he removed it. Then Po showed him the wounds
Speaker 1: on his feet. These, according to Bishop Rossy, were more
Speaker 1: like sores that were in the process of healing, almost
Speaker 1: to the point of no longer being visible. When asked
Speaker 1: why this was so, Po claimed simply that they often
Speaker 1: seemed to be about to disappear, only to suddenly grow
Speaker 1: red and bloody again. Then, finally, Padre Pio removed his
Speaker 1: undershirt to reveal a clear, wine colored mark in the
Speaker 1: shape of a triangle in his left side that looked
Speaker 1: to have bled recently. Bishop Rossy spent a total of
Speaker 1: eight days observing Padre Pio and talking to his colleagues
Speaker 1: to get a sense of his character. All was said
Speaker 1: to have described the man as a much respected and
Speaker 1: genuine devotee to his religion. And no one had a
Speaker 1: bad word to say about him, Having himself found Padre
Speaker 1: Pio to be generally polite and eminently believable, Bishop Rossy
Speaker 1: informed the Vatican's Holy Office that it was impossible to
Speaker 1: deny that the stigmatr wounds were genuine. Some had claimed
Speaker 1: that Padre Pio was simply making the marks himself with
Speaker 1: carbolic acid and then aggravating them to prevent them from healing.
Speaker 1: Bishop Rossy, however, concluded that no such fraud was taking place,
Speaker 1: and that ultimately, as he said, there seemed to be
Speaker 1: enough reason to lean toward the presence of the supernatural
Speaker 1: with regard to the marks. As to whether they truly
Speaker 1: were supernatural, however, he couldn't say. Despite Bishop Rossy's assessment,
Speaker 1: With the Vatican unable to decide exactly what to make
Speaker 1: of Padre po it was decided to err on the
Speaker 1: side of caution and ban him from conducting Mass and confession.
Speaker 1: Such was the strength of public opposition to this decision. However,
Speaker 1: in nineteen thirty three, with po Stigmatyr still seemingly going strong,
Speaker 1: Pope Pious eleven was forced to overturn the ban. Throughout
Speaker 1: his lifetime, po Is said to have healed hundreds of people,
Speaker 1: not limited to the apparent restoring of sight and curing
Speaker 1: of cancer, while tales of his apparent ability to appear
Speaker 1: in two places at the same time were also numerous.
Speaker 1: With the Vatican tacit endorsement of Padre Pio's apparent stigmata
Speaker 1: and mystical abilities, his fame and popularity grew so much
Speaker 1: that he was forced to make his time a ticketed event.
Speaker 1: Over five million people are said to have sought confession
Speaker 1: with him before his eventual death on September twenty third,
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty eight, with his stigmata being said to have
Speaker 1: lasted fifty years, although the question of whether this stigmata
Speaker 1: had been real or not was never formally resolved. The
Speaker 1: Catholic Church agreed to have Padre Pio canonized on account
Speaker 1: of his dedication to the Church and its followers, and
Speaker 1: so in twenty seven Padre Pio became Saint Pio of Pietrol, China.
Speaker 1: The same year that Padre Pio was Canoni, Italian historian
Speaker 1: Sergio Luzzato finally went public with some startling information that
Speaker 1: he'd been sitting on for some time back in twenty
Speaker 1: oh one, while researching a book about the apparently long
Speaker 1: suffering priest Luzato, came across a box in the Vatican's
Speaker 1: archives full of documents relating to his various dealings. Among them,
Speaker 1: he found a small, faded letter written from Padre Pio
Speaker 1: to one of his devotees, Maria de Vito, who just
Speaker 1: so happened to be the cousin of a pharmacist. In
Speaker 1: the letter, Padre Pio asked de Vito if she could
Speaker 1: have her cousin supply him with three hundred grams of
Speaker 1: carbolic acid, imploring her to keep the request a complete
Speaker 1: secret and not to let any of his fellow brothers
Speaker 1: know about it. This letter seemed to all but firm
Speaker 1: the accusation that Padre Pio had inflicted the wounds on
Speaker 1: himself after all. In addition to this, there is another
Speaker 1: interesting aspect of Pio's apparent stigmata in relation to its
Speaker 1: possible legitimacy, that is rarely remarked upon. It's a common
Speaker 1: claim among supposed recipients of stigmata that two of the
Speaker 1: wounds appear in the palms of their hands. According to
Speaker 1: many historians, however, this is a false depiction of the
Speaker 1: actual wounds of crucifixion. It is widely considered that most
Speaker 1: victims of it would not have been nailed through the
Speaker 1: palm of their hands, but rather through the radius and uner,
Speaker 1: the two bones in the forearm that join the hand
Speaker 1: at the wrist, pinning the victim. This way is thought
Speaker 1: to have been crucial in order for the arms to
Speaker 1: be able to support the weight of the body. This
Speaker 1: technique is also thought to have been used so the
Speaker 1: nails could be driven through the median nerve to inflict
Speaker 1: maxim and pain. If Jesus Christ was indeed a real
Speaker 1: person who was crucified, it is highly likely that this
Speaker 1: is the true manner in which it would have happened.
Speaker 1: And one thing is for sure. If that was the
Speaker 1: pain that Padre Pio had been tasked with enduring for
Speaker 1: fifty years while also being able to successfully carry out
Speaker 1: all his theological duties, that truly would have been a miracle.
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Speaker 1: are produced by me Richard McClain smith. Please subscribe and
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Speaker 1: free to get in touch with any thoughts or ideas
Speaker 1: regarding the stories you've heard on the show. Perhaps you
Speaker 1: have an explanation of your own you'd like to share.
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