Three distinguished guests

They arrived on Saturday night.

And they are going to be with us for a few weeks.

Two Italian men and one French woman.

We take it as a great honour that they will be gracing our home with their presence...but who are they?

They are relics (contained in reliquaries) of three great saints:

St Therese de Lisieux - to whom we have a great devotion for many reasons but also because she shares the same birthdate as Mrs Linen.

Pope St Pius X - a Pope who held back the tide of modernism in the early part of the 20th century and who, no doubt, will do so again one day.

And Padre Pio - (thanks to a friend, my devotion to this wonderful saint has been re-ignited in recent months).

The relics have been loaned by our priest who is one of the great priests of our time.
May God bless him and spare him.

If I had been able to choose three saints, I think that I would have chosen The Little Flower, Pope St Pius X and St Pio - that's pretty fantastic don't you agree?

If you could choose three saints as house guests, whom would you select?

Looking under stones and Padre Pio

It happened in his lifetime when he was accused and rejected and, of course, it was bound to happen after his death and canonisation.

An Italian journalist has done an investigation into the stigmata of the Saint and, in turning over stones, has dug up some murky alleged facts.

It is a sad fact that any journalist of any competency, and, most especially, Italian ones, can create a nuance out of innocence, weave a prejudice into a belief, distort the truth with half truths.

Damian Thompson has the full story and speculates that the real harm done by this latest accusation, will be the fall-out that will only add to the other snide cases made against the holy and not so holy.
I am thinking (as is Damian, I believe) of the Nazi slurs against Pope Pius XII (holy man) and the paedophilia scandals (not so holy men).

You may read his report here and then pause awhile to read Paul Priest's comments which are, as always, so very sound.

A Prayer

 

by Saint Pio of Pietrelcina

  

May Jesus comfort you
     in all your afflictions.
     May He sustain you in dangers,
     watch over you always with His grace,
     and indicate the safe path
     that leads to eternal salvation.
     And may He render you always
     dearer to His Divine Heart
     and always more worthy of Paradise.   

 Amen 

 

FEAST OF ST PIO! A SAINT OF OUR TIME!

"Prayer is the best weapon we possess, the key

that opens the heart of God"

The feast of a great saint, one who died only in 1968 and whose funeral is recorded on film.
The accounts of Padre Pio, the miracles wrought through his intercession, the episodes of bilocation and his ability to read the souls of men are almost too numerous to select any particular one. So I have chosen to feature an extract regarding the day that he received the stigmata (20th September 1918)

It was June 15, 1921, and in answer to a question posed by Bishop Rossi, Padre Pio said: "On Sept. 20, 1918, I was in the choir of the church after celebrating Mass, making the thanksgiving when I was suddenly overtaken by powerful trembling and then there came calm and I saw Our Lord in his crucified form.
"He was lamenting the ingratitude of men, especially those consecrated to him and favored by him."
"Then," Padre Pio continued, "his suffering was apparent as was his desire to join souls to his Passion. He invited me to let his pains enter into me and to meditate on them and at the same time concern myself with the salvation of others. Following this, I felt full of compassion for the Lord's pains and I asked him what I could do.
"I heard this voice: 'I will unite you with my Passion.' And after this the vision disappeared, I came back to myself, my reason returned and I saw these signs here from which blood flowed. Before this I did not have these."
Padre Pio then said that the stigmata were not the result of a personal request of his own but came from an invitation of the Lord, who, lamenting the ingratitude of men, and consecrated persons in particular, conferred on Padre Pio a mission as the culmination of an interior mystical journey of preparation.

This video clip (sorry about the awful and inappropriate guitar twanging) gives a very moving picture of the piety and devotion this great saint had when celebrating the Holy Mass, the Mass of all time, the Tridentine Latin Mass - "he suffered at every consecration during Mass". Worth remembering that Vatican officials treated him abysmally and, for many years he was treated as an outcast, even after his death.

Padre Pio, St Pio - Ora pro nobis

Want to be a modern martyr and not be killed?

Here's how.....

...The Conference of English and Welsh Bishops has approved one's right to kneel to receive Holy Communion. Yes, that is correct. I have re-read Fr Tim's blog and there it is in black and white....here's what the Bishops state:-


"...... individual members of the faithful may choose to receive Communion while kneeling".

I know that, Fr T advises against blogging in letters large and clear in a more recent post but.....I just cannot resist!
This is your chance to become a martyr for Christ; no communion rails? just kneel - Extraordinary Ministers? just kneel - unsympathetic parish priest? just kneel - parish scandalmongers? ignore 'em and just kneel!
We are all bound to obey our Bishops in matters of legitimate teaching regarding the Faith so please.... let's get on and do it!

If Padre Pio could do it.........?

Padre Pio - his kind of watch

Time for reflection

The Path Less Taken has been running a series of posts on St Pio. They reminded me of Fr Corapi's account of a wealthy woman who interupted the Saint whilst he was meditating. "Oh Padre Pio". Warbled the woman. "Please tell me something nice".
He leant over and whispered in her ear: "Death comes soon".