Posted on 10/25/2007 9:24:05 AM PDT by NYer
The Other Christ: Padre Pio and 19th Century Italy, by the historian Sergio Luzzatto, draws on a document found in the Vatican's archive.
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The document reveals the testimony of a pharmacist who said that the young Padre Pio bought four grams of carbolic acid in 1919.
"I was an admirer of Padre Pio and I met him for the first time on 31 July 1919," wrote Maria De Vito.
She claimed to have spent a month with the priest in the southern town of San Giovanni Rotondo, seeing him often.
"Padre Pio called me to him in complete secrecy and telling me not to tell his fellow brothers, he gave me personally an empty bottle, and asked if I would act as a chauffeur to transport it back from Foggia to San Giovanni Rotondo with four grams of pure carbolic acid.
"He explained that the acid was for disinfecting syringes for injections. He also asked for other things, such as Valda pastilles."
The testimony was originally presented to the Vatican by the Archbishop of Manfredonia, Pasquale Gagliardi, as proof that Padre Pio caused his own stigmata with acid.
It was examined by the Holy See during the beatification process of Padre Pio and apparently dismissed.
Padre Pio, whose real name was Francesco Forgione, died in 1968. He was made a saint in 2002. A recent survey in Italy showed that more people prayed to him than to Jesus or the Virgin Mary. He exhibited stigmata throughout his life, starting in 1911.
The new allegations were greeted with an instant dismissal from his supporters. The Catholic Anti-Defamation League said Mr Luzzatto was a liar and was "spreading anti-Catholic libels".
Pietro Siffi, the president of the League, said: "We would like to remind Mr Luzzatto that according to Catholic doctrine, canonisation carries with it papal infallibility.
"We would like to suggest to Mr Luzzatto that he dedicates his energies to studying religion properly."
Actually, about .5% anxiety, 99.5% peace that peaces understanding here! :-) Thank you! Had a preliminary test today, so far, so good! :-)
Jesus loves his Mother with his whole heart. Mary's savior is her son Jesus, the Christ, who kept her from the stain of original sin. A belief since the early Church Fathers.
The Ascension of Isaiah
"[T]he report concerning the child was noised abroad in Bethlehem. Some said, ‘The Virgin Mary has given birth before she was married two months.’ And many said, ‘She has not given birth; the midwife has not gone up to her, and we heard no cries of pain’" (Ascension of Isaiah 11 [A.D. 70]).
The Odes of Solomon
"So the Virgin became a mother with great mercies. And she labored and bore the Son, but without pain, because it did not occur without purpose. And she did not seek a midwife, because he caused her to give life. She bore as a strong man, with will . . . " (Odes of Solomon 19 [A.D. 80]).
St. Ambrose
"Come, then, and search out your sheep, not through your servants or hired men, but do it yourself. Lift me up bodily and in the flesh, which is fallen in Adam. Lift me up not from Sarah but from Mary, a virgin not only undefiled, but a virgin whom grace had made inviolate, free of every stain of sin" (Commentary on Psalm 118:22–30 [A.D. 387]).
St. Augustine
"Having excepted the holy Virgin Mary, concerning whom, on account of the honor of the Lord, I wish to have absolutely no question when treating of sins—for how do we know what abundance of grace for the total overcoming of sin was conferred upon her, who merited to conceive and bear him in whom there was no sin?—so, I say, with the exception of the Virgin, if we could have gathered together all those holy men and women, when they were living here, and had asked them whether they were without sin, what do we suppose would have been their answer?" (Nature and Grace 36:42 [A.D. 415]).
Hail Mary, Full of Grace! What a wonderful gift to His Mother!
Thank you so much for posting this. Beautiful summary! What a treasury of Scripture!
May I ask why you are ‘sighing’?
This is wonderful.
These sources are all *outside* the Holy Bible, yes? I’ve never seen them before. Thanks for all the info!
Talk about intellectual lazyness...the words are "Co-Redemptrix" and "Mediatrix of All Graces". If you are going to bash the Catholic Church you could at least get the words right. You sound like Archie Bunker, dingbat!
I (ahem) would not have been so foolhardy.
Also, what was the faith when the New Testament didn't exist yet? It was passed down faithfully via oral tradition.
So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by letter" (2 Thess. 2:15)
“May I ask why you are ‘sighing’?”
Because sometimes MD is still such an Anglican!
Among the Orthodox we almost all of us, individually and as families have a special saint or saints to whom we feel a particular kinship. For example, I have a particular devotion to +John Chrysostomos and +Aidan while my family has a familial devotion to +Nektarios of Aegina. We will pray that they intercede for us, we keep icons of them in our icon corners and down in Greece some families, mine for example, will have small free standing family chapels named after a saint to whom the builder of the chapel had a special devotion. Its something like in your family. I have several cients who are Indian and it is fascinating how many of our Orthodox customs, especially surrounding commemoration of the dead, seem to have a remarkable similarity to Indian practices.
“Oh, man, brothah. Our — um, dialog-partners -— should have been given a fair warning never, never, never to argue with you about the Greek language!”
Oh, actually its good that people do because sometimes it clears up mistakes that might have been around a very long time. We all learn stuff here, Mrs. D O!
If it has alcohol, I’ll drink it. I do love ouzo though!
F
He is the Patron Saint of Bingo, you know!
;-o)
But I am stumped by a responsible translation for ousion, and have been for decades. I tend to mutter "ousion" (or at least to think it) and to ask myself, "Is this person talking ousion or hypostasis?" every time somebody says substance.
And then , of course, around the time subjective and objective switched meanings, substance came to mean "hyle", and everything fell apart as far as any kind of terminological coherence is concerned.
αναξιος ειμι
Heh heh heh
“I do love ouzo though!”
Frank, though I would never, ever, assign you amateur status, you have to remember just how very dangerous ouzo can be. Ray Milland in The Lost Weekend had nothing on some of us who tangled a bit too much with “the milky death”! :)
And you think I am totally unfamiliar with the “milky death?” I spoke in tongues at the time, you know! I believe it was some language channeled from 5409 B.C.
BTW, I love it when Greeks write Greek. You’d think some of our other “brethern” here invented the language...
;-o)
You know, MD, none of them are real good but I guess I'd have to go with "One in Essence with", but it doesn't really mean Essence. It doesn't mean "being" either and it certainly doesn't mean "substance" but it is close to "substantia".
"αναξιος ειμι"
Μπραβο σου, Αμερικανακι, αλλα, αληθινα, αξιος εσις!
Ho, Ho, Ho!
“Yes, that is what is fascinating to me too! I wonder if it was the traditional British influence, or the missionaries to India, because Hinduism seems to ‘absorb’ pretty much every other religion into itself.”
Oh, I think its quite the opposite. I believe those practices have pre-Christian roots and are indigenous to the cultures they arose in. These sorts of practices are examples of what the Fathers called “spori” or seeds of the True Faith which they, and we for that matter, saw in virtually all pre-Christian religions.
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