Padre Pio ‘faked his stigmata with acid’
November 3, 2007 by Luci
Padre Pio, the friar with fingerless gloves whose image is found on a million Catholic key chains; who was canonised before 200,000 ecstatic pilgrims five years ago, was a charlatan who deliberately mutilated himself with acid to give the appearance of bearing the stigmata of Christ, according to evidence to be published next week.
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 Italian historian Sergio Luzzatto will release Padre Pio, Miracles and politics in 20th century Italy – a book producing new evidence from Vatican archives, which he says proves that the charismatic friar secretly procured carbolic acid with which to burn his hands, feet and sides.
The allegations are not new: two successive popes regarded Padre Pio as a fraud. By 1920, when Pio was 33 and was already exhibiting his scars before masses of pilgrims, the church was worried that his cult was spinning out of control. Reports commissioned by the church claimed Pio regularly scourged himself with a metal-tipped whip, and had sex with women twice a week. For many years Pio was banned from celebrating mass in public.
Of particular concern to the church were the ugly, weeping wounds which Pio concealed under those fingerless gloves. The friar claimed that he had received the stigmata of Christ – wounds to his hands, feet and side like those suffered by Christ during his crucifixion – at the culmination of a mystical seizure.
A doctor sent by the Vatican to examine them concluded that the wounds were probably caused and maintained artificially. To test the hypothesis he bound the wounds and sealed the bandage to prevent it being tampered with. But on examination a month later the doctor was nonplussed to find that the wounds had failed to heal.
Yet now Mr Luzzatto claims to have unearthed documents that prove beyond reasonable doubt that the friar was a trickster.
In the summer of 1919, the 28-year-old cousin of a pharmacist in the southern city of Foggia, a deeply religious young woman called Maria de Vito, made the pilgrimage to Pio’s church, San Giovanni. The pharmacist told his local bishop, Mgr Salvatore Bella, “When she returned to Foggia she brought the greetings of Padre Pio and asked me in his name, and in strict secrecy, for carbolic acid, telling me that Padre Pio had need of it, and giving me the little bottle he had given her, capacity 100g, and with a skull and crossbones.”
More at link:
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article3093806.ece
False prophet, anyone?
When I was a boy in Cleveland in the 50s, we heard about a preacher who had setup a church in a storefront who after preaching his sermon, and more importantly taking up the collection, would mesmerize his flock by displaying the “Blood of Jesus” on a white sheet held by his deacons over the pulpit. Of course, seeing blood is important to boys who’re 9 and 10 years old. As long as its not our own. So we’d camp outside the storefront during the summer evenings, trying to peek inside to see Jesus’ blood. We never made in time.
Then later that summer right before school started back, the cops raided the place and shut it down. Being the PK of the group my friends naturally turned to me for an explanation of how this could happen to a man of god. All I could think at the time was what my Dad had said about Jesus was the Holy Ghost, or some such thing. So I told them he must have been a crook because everyone knew that ghost’s don’t bleed.
But while reading this thread post I could only shake my head at the things people will believe in. And how even when faced with incontrovertible proof, they’ll find answers, reasons, justifications and plain old excuses as to why God didn’t come through — once again. Oh, but its STILL ALL TRUE. Everything. Just not this time. Maybe next time. But in this case, all I can say is: well, at least faking the stigmata got him laid. And the layee’s got a story they could tell for the rest of their lives on how they Screwed the Stigmata Man.
And fooling around with acid is no joke. So this guy wasn’t totally stupid. He knew enough to keep the carbolic acid away from his junk.
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Abuse is rampant among clergy, who, too often, remain unchecked in their power and unpunished for their crimes. Survivors of this abuse share their stories.
http://www.alternet.org/rights/66551/
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Not only false prophet, but the guy is probably mentally ill and needs to get checked for Munchausen syndrome.
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That ‘carbolic acid’ theory for Padre Pio’s stigmata is so old it has gone mouldy. I must have read at least 4 biographies of Padre Pio and each one mentioned the ‘carbolic acid’ allegation which simply doesn’t add up. Why the media should get so overheated about it at this late hour remains a mystery. Anything to sell bumpf. Or just the usual old Catholic-bashing routine? Hi-ho. Is that all that Sergio Lazotto can come up with? Sorry Mr Lazzotto, you’ll have try much harder than this.
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