Padre Pio at times felt as if he were sinking through quicksand into hell, yet he continued to wait for God. Constantly he repeated, as an act of faith, the words of Job, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust him” (Jb 13:15, KJV). He continued diligently to search the Scriptures, deriving comfort from the fact that Jonah, Jeremiah, David, and Paul, like him, passed through the same deep waters of desolation. He was also comforted by Padre Benedetto, whom he accepted as the “internal and external judge” of his soul. Padre Benedetto wrote to Padre Pio, “You must calm yourself by means of my assurances and hold them as if sworn by oath.” In other words, Padre Pio was to have confidence and not despair of God’s mercy, if for no other reason than he was ordered to do so through “holy obedience.” The “Night,” Padre Benedetto explained, was sent by God “to extinguish human understanding so that divine understanding can take its place, and you, having been stripped of the … usual way of using your mental faculties, might be able to rise to that supernatural and heavenly purification.”21 Pannullo, however, was not as helpful as Padre Benedetto, for Padre Pio wrote, “He scolds me and I find no consolation in his sermons to me.”22
A Conversation with an Angel
Padre Pio continued to be subject to attacks by demonic forces. In August 1912, for a space of several days, whenever he decided to write to his superiors, he was seized with violent migraine headaches and spasms in his writing arm. Recognizing devilish interference, he prayed and then was able to write. The devil continued to visit him with temptations against purity, which Padre Pio in his modesty did not detail. In addition, he continued to be subject to physical attacks by infernal forces, accompanied by terrifying noises clearly audible to neighbors. But he also continued to receive visits from his guardian angel, as well as from Jesus and Mary. It was his angel who frequently rescued him from physical assaults by demonic powers. This is the topic of a beautiful but rather strange letter that Pio wrote in November 1912 to Padre Agostino:
I cannot describe to you how those wretched creatures beat me. Sometimes I feel as if I were near death. Saturday it seemed as if they really wanted to finish me, and I didn’t know which way to turn, so I turned to my angel, who, after keeping me waiting for a time, appeared and flew all around me and, with his angelic voice, sang hymns to the Divine Majesty.
There followed one of those usual discussions. I scolded him harshly for making me wait so long while I was continually calling for him to help me. In order to punish him, I did not want to look him in the face. I wanted to withdraw and get away from him. But the poor fellow overtook me, almost weeping, and caught hold of me, trying to make me look at him. And then I glanced into his face and found him full of regret.
“My dear boy, [the angel said], I am always near you. I always hover about you with the love aroused by your gratitude to the Beloved of your heart. My love for you will not pass away, even with your earthly life. I know that your generous heart always palpitates with yearning for him whom we both love. You would climb every mountain and traverse every desert in search of him, to see him again, to embrace him again … and ask him to break immediately the chain which unites you to the body…. You would tell him that, separated here from him in this world, you have more sadness than joy…. As for now, he is able to give you only the ray of a star, the perfume of a flower, the note of a harp, the caress of a breeze. But do not cease to ask him insistently for [what you desire], because his supreme delight is to have you with him. And although he cannot yet satisfy you, since Providence wills that you remain in exile a little longer, in the end he will fulfill your desire.”23
It is clear that even when Padre Pio cried out that God had forsaken him, this situation was often followed by encounters with Jesus, Mary, and his guardian angel, who, at times, responded to questions that his superiors put to him. To the end of his life, it caused him great anguish that, although heaven often showed him the state of others’ souls, he remained in the dark about his own.
“I Want to Bring Everyone to God!”
Most of Padre Pio’s visions related to his ministry to others. For instance, in March 1913, he described a vision in which Jesus deplored the lack of spirituality among contemporary Christians and a lack of dedication among the clergy. In this bodily vision, Jesus appeared in human form and spoke words perceptible to Padre Pio’s physical ears. At times, the Lord was silent; at other times, his throat was choked with sobs as he lamented that people
… make no effort to control themselves amidst their temptations and … even delight in their iniquity. The souls in whom I most delight lose their faith when they are put to the test. They ignore me, day and night, in the churches. They no longer care about the Sacrament of the Altar…. No one cares any more about the love that I bear them. I am continually saddened. My house has become for many a theater of amusements…. My ministers … whom I have loved as the apple of my eye … ought to have comforted my heart, which is now filled with sorrow. They ought to have aided me in the redemption of souls, but instead … I receive ingratitude and thanklessness from them. Son, I see many of them who … betray me with hypocritical faces and … sacrilegious Communions.24
Jesus seems almost humanly petulant in this vision, and it further kindled Padre Pio’s zeal to win souls for Christ and to renew his self-offering as a victim. In other visions, Jesus presented souls to Padre Pio whom he never met before. Through his revelations, Padre Pio learned about the interior state of these souls so that he could help them when God gave him the opportunity to meet them.
Those inclined to dismiss Padre Pio as a madman (or at least a sane man with a very vivid imagination) must understand that his revelations and locutions usually corresponded to some generally observable reality. The supersensible communications almost always resulted in some act of kindness or concern, and all his supernatural experiences centered on love for God and man. Moreover, the hellish noises that Padre Pio reported could sometimes be heard by others.
The more Padre Pio’s spiritual life intensified, the more his love and concern grew for other people. In a letter to Padre Agostino written in the fall of 1915, Padre Pio prayed that God would give life to souls dead in sin:
I have always implored you, trembling as I beg you now, in your mercy, to withdraw the thunderbolt of thy glance from my unhappy brethren. You have said, O my sweet Lord, that “Love is as strong as death and lasts as long as hell”; therefore, look with an eye of ineffable sweetness upon these dead brethren. Chain them to yourself with a strong bond.
May all these dead souls arise, O Lord! O Jesus, Lazarus [whom Jesus raised four days after death] made no request at all that you should raise him. The prayers of a sinful woman sufficed for him. Ah, behold, my Divine Lord, another soul, also sinful and guilty beyond all measure, who beseeches you in behalf of a multitude of dead souls who have no interest in praying to you. I beg you to raise them. You know, my Lord and King, the cruel martyrdom that these Lazaruses cause me. Call them with a cry so powerful as to give them life, and at thy command, let them come forth from the sepulchre of their obscene pleasures!25
Much of Padre Pio’s spiritual life was directed at the raising of modern-day Lazaruses. All of it fed into his ministry for the salvation of souls. Frequently he prayed, echoing Moses: “Either save this people or blot me out of thy book of life!” Once someone told him of a prophecy that a member of the Franciscan order would lead a third of the world to Christ, implying that it referred to him. Padre Pio retorted, “What do I want with a third? More! More! I want to bring everyone to God!”26
Chapter Nine
Return to the Friary
“The Saint at Mecca”
Although Padre Benedetto continued to function as Padre Pio’s spiritual director and Padre Agostino continued to give him advice and counsel, both men increasingly came to look to their protégé for wisdom in their own difficulties. It is interesting to read through the letters the three priests sent to one another during this period. Padre Pio would agonize about his spiritual