Posted on 01/26/2008 7:47:14 AM PST by Ottofire
SAN GIOVANNI ROTONDO, Italy (CNS) -- The body of St. Padre Pio will be exhumed, studied and displayed for public veneration from mid-April to late September, said the archbishop who oversees the shrine where the saint is buried.
Archbishop Domenico D'Ambrosio, papal delegate for the shrine in San Giovanni Rotondo, announced Jan. 6 that he and the Capuchin friars of Padre Pio's community had decided it was important to verify the condition of the saint's body and find a way to ensure its preservation.
"It is my personal conviction and that of the confreres of St. Pio that we have an obligation to give the generations that will come after us the possibility of venerating and preserving in the best possible way the mortal remains of St. Pio," Archbishop D'Ambrosio said.
"A further motive for rejoicing," he said, stems from the fact that the Capuchins, with Vatican approval, "have authorized the exposition and public veneration of the saint's body for several months beginning in mid-April."
In addition to marking the 40th anniversary of Padre Pio's death Sept. 23, 1968, the public veneration of his remains also will coincide with the 90th anniversary of the day on which he was believed to have received the stigmata, bloody wounds recalling the crucifixion wounds of Jesus.
According to the Capuchins, Padre Pio received the stigmata Sept. 20, 1918.
Immediately after Archbishop D'Ambrosio announced the exhumation of Padre Pio's body, Italian newspapers and television stations began reporting that members of his family were opposed to the move and were threatening to sue the archbishop and the Capuchins.
But a spokesman for the family denied the rumors and Archbishop D'Ambrosio told Avvenire, the Italian Catholic daily newspaper, that he had been in contact with the family and they raised no objections.
Padre Pio was born Francesco Forgione May 25, 1887, in Pietrelcina, Italy. As a Capuchin, he was a famed confessor and preacher and had a widespread reputation as one whose prayers were effective in procuring miraculous cures. Pope John Paul II beatified him in 1999 and canonized him in 2002.
“to verify the condition of the saint’s body and find a way to ensure its preservation.”
Why? If the soul has left, isn’t it a useless shell?
Indeed.
Historically speaking, the incorruptibility of the mortal remains is looked at as one of the many signs of sainthood. St. Bernadette of Lourdes body is incorrupt as are many other bodies of saints throughout the ages.
many of the saints bodies are incorrupt, defying so-call science....just another sign of God’s power to his people.
An attack on the blessed memory of St. Padre Pio was attempted not long ago in the press. A so-called journalist insinuated that Padre Pio’s purchase of carbolic acid was evidence of deliberately inducing his stigmata.
The fact that the first step for anyone with stigmatic wounds is supposed to be a attempt to cure them naturally, — and therefore to disinfect them — was not mentioned by the “journalist”.
People should be able to venerate Padre Pio’s relics; he is among the most popular modern saints.
**..incorruptibility of mortal remains..**
Isn’t that an oxymoron????????
They are dead, right, they’re organs useless? Life is in the blood, and the blood in these corpses is dead!
Put any one of these bodies out in the sunshine, in the tropical heat of the equatorial regions, then come back a week later.
Going around digging up long dead bodies? You folks are morbid.
That’s right. This rabbit’s foot lucky charm didn’t do much for the rabbit. LOL
Digging up the dead to worship a corpse ?
When Padre Pio is displayed, we’ll send you a picture.
If I dug up a 40 year old corpse to display to the public, I have a hunch I’d be arrested.
Catholic saints are not dead and their bodies are often an object of public veneration, and always have been.
And you are ignorant.
Good thing you are not attributing motives to someone never met. Jump to assumptions much?
I did a search and nothing came up.
What support do you have from Elohim's Word to support the veneration of the dead ? Or is it paganism ? If he is not alive then he is dead !
b'SHEM Yah'shua
I read somewhere that Padre’s family did not want his body exhumed.
“Why? If the soul has left, isn’t it a useless shell?”
Veneration of relics (most often body parts) of saints is nearly as old as The Church. If I recall correctly, and Alex can if I am wrong, such veneration began in 155 AD after the martyrdom of +Polycarp.
It’s funny you mention St. Polycarp, since today was his feast day on the pre-Vatican II sanctoral calendar. :-)
The Chinese and Japanese engage in "ancestor worship," but even they cremated their dead, if memory serves.
“It’s funny you mention St. Polycarp, since today was his feast day on the pre-Vatican II sanctoral calendar. :-)”
HeHeHe! :)
“And Elisha died, and they buried him... And it came to pass that as they were burying a man, that behold, they saw a band of men [Moabites], and they cast the man into the grave of Elisha: and as soon as he touched the bones of Elisha, he revived and stood up on his feet” (IV Kings 13:20-21).
You might find this interesting, even if you don’t agree.
http://www.orthodoxinfo.com/general/relics.aspx
Interestingly enough, the only Catholic parish named for St. Polycarp is in my home state of Delaware, in a town named Smyrna. ;-) I went there once. The pastor is a nice conservative priest.
ping
I think you are referring to 2 Kings 13:20-21.
No, that is correct. In some versions of the Bible, the two books of Samuel are known as 1 and 2 Kings, and the two books of Kings are known as 3 and 4 Kings.
The book is M'lakhim Bet 13:21 in the Tanach
και εγενετο αυτων θαπτοντων τον ανδρα και ιδου ειδον τον μονοζωνον και ερριψαν τον ανδρα εν τω ταφω Ελισαιε και επορευθη και ηψατο των οστεων Ελισαιε και εζησεν και ανεστη επι τους ποδας αυτου
Cool font
“Cool font”
Its in your computer! :)
And you are priggish.
Cool it, and educate yourself.
Thank you both.
**And you are ignorant.**
Hey, I can take all the verbal abuse you want to hand out. I’m sure you can do better than that!
Unlike some, I won’t cry to the mods, ever. I’m a big supporter of the 1st ammendment. I had a boss that should offer classes in verbal abuse to Marine drill Sgts. Verbal abuse is nothing compared to what Jesus was put through.
By the way, the only corpses Jesus brought out of the grave were restored to life. Anybody can dig up a dead one, and it remain dead.
Should we go and dig up a few thousand to see how many of them have shells that have changed little?
Cheers, and Lord bless!
ping to #35
You are, as always, very welcome! :)
The miracle of Elisha’s bones:
Elisha asked for a double portion of the power God gave Elijah, who was recorded as peforming seven miracles. The ‘touching the bones’ miracle was Elisha’s 14th.
Those ‘pallbearers’ involved had to abort their burial plans for the dead man when they spied the approach of the band of Moabites. They had no time, ditch the body and run. I’m sure if they’d had the slightest hint that that miracle would happen, the text would have stated that as their plan.
So that passage is the RC/EO basis for digging up corpses?
Well, go ahead, knock yourselves out.
WWJD
Thank you? I didn’t contribute any cool texts to the discussion. ;-)
It's an interesting insight of some of the ancients to say that. Modern science confirms that a living cell is not programmed to die, but rather to live indefinitely!
Rather then being rooted in sin (although an argument can be made that sinful ways contribute heavily), natural "corruption" (aging and death) of a cell is brought about by accumulated damage from the cell's own metabolism—free radicals, released from the cell's mitochondria (metabolic power houses), that relentlessly bombard and damage our DNA.
The body constantly repairs this damage (that's why you need 8 hours of sleep), but it's a losing battle over time. Natural aging and death is simply a sum-total of damage and repair done to our system, "wear and tear" if you will, as the body's own ability to repair itself is overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of damage incurred over time.
So, while the body was not created to die, it dies from its own wear and tear, from its internal combustion byproducts; ironically, the cell dies from its very essence of life—it burns faster than it can build.
Studies have shown that different animals of approximately the same size with different average life spans invariably show that those species with lower free radical production live longer and age slower.
We could argue that sinful lifestyles tend to increase body's "wear and tear" and minimize body's self-reparing mechanism (lack of sleep, excesisve exposure to sun), etc., in addition to our genetic makeup, but the fact is that even saints die—not so much because of Adam's transgression but because their cells produce highly reactive free radicals.
God's people do not need signs of His power...We walk by faith, not by sight...
We have the witness of the Holy Spirit...
If you did happen to come across a preserved dead body, there'd be no way to tell if if was preserved by God, or Satan...
Going to hang 'em on the wall, in between the deer head and the pet poodle???
“God’s people do not need signs of His power...We walk by faith, not by sight...”
Is that why the thousands of “ecclesial groups” seem to be walking in so many different directions, I?
The veneration of relics is nearly as old as The Church itself, I. No one says you have to believe in the power of relics, though the overwhelming majority of Christians today do and always and everywhere have. I must say, however, that if I believed in the sort of God you folks do, One Whose apparently all consuming wrath at His creation could only be assuaged by the bloody torture death of His completely innocent Son, I’d probably leave off the scorn lest it turn out that I’m wrong and The Church right.
>The veneration of relics is nearly as old as The Church itself, I. No one says you have to believe in the power of relics, though the overwhelming majority of Christians today do and always and everywhere have. I must say, however, that if I believed in the sort of God you folks do, One Whose apparently all consuming wrath at His creation could only be assuaged by the bloody torture death of His completely innocent Son, I’d probably leave off the scorn lest it turn out that I’m wrong and The Church right.
Actually the veneration of relics used by God is much older than Christianity:
2 Kings 18
1Now it came about in the third year of Hoshea, the son of Elah king of Israel, that Hezekiah the son of Ahaz king of Judah became king.
2He was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem; and his mother’s name was Abi the daughter of Zechariah.
3 He did right in the sight of the LORD, according to all that his father David had done.
4 He removed the high places and broke down the sacred pillars and cut down the Asherah He also broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the sons of Israel burned incense to it; and it was called Nehushtan.
5 He trusted in the LORD, the God of Israel; so that after him there was none like him among all the kings of Judah, nor among those who were before him.
6For he clung to the LORD; he did not depart from following Him, but kept His commandments, which the LORD had commanded Moses.
Note that the bronze snake, commanded by God for the salvation of the people of Israel in the desert from the poisonous snakes is venerated.
Note that a righteous King of Judah, clinging to the Lord and the laws of Moses, destroyed this idol when the sons of Israel venerate it by burning incense to it. This was destroyed alongside the Asherah, the idols to the Queen of Heaven.
Last I heard, exposed bodies decomposed at the latitude of France, too. And yet St. Bernadette's body has not so decomposed. That is the whole point of what "incorruptibility" means, and is another physical proof of a miracle.
If you do not understand something, it is wise not to mock it.
You:
many of the saints bodies are incorrupt, defying so-call science....just another sign of God’s power to his people
God’s people do not need signs of His power...We walk by faith, not by sight...
We have the witness of the Holy Spirit...
If you did happen to come across a preserved dead body, there’d be no way to tell if if was preserved by God, or Satan...
ME: first, if we have only the witness of the holy spirit, then there would be no need for the many signs Christ performed after his ressurection
secondly, it would make no sense for satan to be involved in incorruptible christian bodies, as these examples, DRAW PEOPLE CLOSER TO CHRIST...and i know of only one person in the last 2000 plus years that draws people to Him...
I should have pinged you to my post #22.
I don’t care how ‘healthy it looks, can you make it function again? If the heart, brain, lungs, etc. are irrepairable, it is corrupted!
That is so typical of the RC/EO system which relies so much on the outside, the visual aides, using countless statues, paintings, ‘icons’, relics, etc. that are just another form of the lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, pride of life.
The apostles refused and rebuked any veneration toward themselves, pointing souls to Jesus Christ.
When you’ve truly been filled with the Holy Ghost, the last thing you are going to do is dig up dead bodies to ‘venerate’. The ‘harvest’ that the Lord demands is done during the day, when there is the light of life, not in the darkness of death.
Of course, only God can do that, but that isn't the point. The point is that the body hasn't been subject to the natural processes of decay. If not a miracle, then how do you account for the immunity to that "universal" natural process??
"That is so typical of the RC/EO system which relies so much on the outside, the visual aides, using countless statues, paintings, ‘icons’, relics, etc. that are just another form of the lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, pride of life.
There's nothing wrong with using visual aids. The PURPOSE of all those "visual aids" (if you bother to study history) is to EDUCATE the congregation in the faith. You've got to remember that up until Gutenberg, the vast majority of peopl e COULD NOT READ. So all those things you refer to were teaching aids to help in understanding the faith. The rest of the sentence about "lust this and lust that" is simply BS.
"The apostles refused and rebuked any veneration toward themselves, pointing souls to Jesus Christ."
Of course they did. But this didn't keep even their shadows from having miraculous effects.
"When you’ve truly been filled with the Holy Ghost, the last thing you are going to do is dig up dead bodies to ‘venerate’." "The ‘harvest’ that the Lord demands is done during the day, when there is the light of life, not in the darkness of death."
Actually, the Lord works anywhere and everywhere He wills, light or dark.
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