St. Padre Pio Personality

Padre Lodovico da San Giovanni Rotondo: “He is kind and affable with everyone; always smiling; sometimes he makes jokes, too.”[1]

Padre Pietro: He is candid, kind, charming, charitable, obedient, modest, and pious.[2]

Padre Luigi: He is always indifferent before any honor. We have never seen him abandon his simplicity.[3]

Padre Eusebio:” Padre Pio was a priest in whom God was particularly alive.”[4] “In Padre Pio the supernatural mixed with the natural in a way they you were unable to distinguish were the first ended and the second started.”[5] “Padre Pio was the man of two worlds: heaven and earth.”[6]

Padre Alessandro: “Like the Morgione rock in Pietrelcina, Padre Pio had an almost stubborn interior stability.”[7]

Padre Alessio: “In San Giovanni Rotondo the extraordinary became ordinary, and nobody paid much attention to it.”[8]

Maria Winowska: Padre Pio had all the beautiful qualities of a southern Italian, including a touch of humor that inspired in him immediate answers and biting witticisms, flavored by peasant shrewdness.[10] “Padre Pio never stopped to say “Yes” to God.^{^[11]}

Padre Pio baptizing the GI Dan Steel

Opera tenor Beniamino Gigli singing "Mamma" for Padre Pio

Mons. Rossi in 1921: “Whatever extraordinary happens in the person of Padre Pio cannot be explained. But it certainly doesn’t happen through diabolic intervention, deception or fraud.”[13]

Bishop Paolo Carta: “He reached the summit of transforming union and mystical experience.”[15]

Barbara Ward: “Padre Pio was the last man in the world to forget that Our Lord not only preached to souls but also healed bodies and promised Heaven to those that feed the hungry and clothe the naked.”[16]

Eileen Dunn Bertanzetti: “Despite all his afflictions of body and soul, Padre Pio continued to trust Christ and to find great joy in God.”[17] “Padre Pio was bargaining with God for souls”[18]

Dorothy Gaudiose: “His authenticity, originality, and genuineness were indisputable, and the sincerity of his spirit was above suspicions.”[19]

Pope Benedict XV in 1920: “Padre Pio is truly a man of God. He is not appreciated by all, as he deserves to be.”[20] [21]

Paul VI: “Padre Pio was a representative of Our Lord marked with the imprint of his wounds. He was a man of prayer and suffering.”[22]

Dr. Pavone: “At the Casa Sollievo Padre Pio told continually the nuns, the nurses, the doctors: “When you see the patient, look at Jesus Christ. In every sick person, see Jesus suffering. In the sick poor see Jesus twice, because Jesus was very poor.”[23]

Padre Lorenzo da San Marco in Lamis: “For the time he was at Montefusco he was always exemplary. He was the most exemplary, not a grumbler.”[24]

Father Joseph Pius: “To encounter Padre Pio was likely reading medieval history.”[25]

Padre Saint John: “He had a nice chuckle and a nice smile. He was a gentle person. He had a very dignified walk. He spoke a few English words.”[27]

Padre Francesco Napolitano: “Padre Pio’s life on earth was in perpetual union with God.”[28]

Padre Lorenzo: “Padre Agostino and Padre Benedetto used to go to Padre Pio for advice, and some friars would comment: “They went to consult the saint in Mecca.”[29]

Padre Meyer: “The crowd would steal his handkerchief, cut pieces from his habit and cut off his cord. He would not even notice it with all the people pushing and pulling.”[30] Sometimes Padre Pio took his cord and twirled it menacingly at people grabbing him. He would say: “This is paganism! This is fanaticism!”[31]

Suzanne Duchess of St. Alban: “The fascination of his gruff manner and the magnetism of his extraordinary saintliness drew people to him, and once they had met him. The experience marked them for life.”[32]

Heidi: “Being in San Giovanni Rotondo is like having a mirror up to your face, but instead of showing your face, it reflects your soul.”[33]

Angelo Mischitelli: “A life between cell, choir, confessional, altar, hallway and veranda.”[34]

Giovanni Bardazzi: “Padre Pio is goodness walking,” (La bonta’ che cammina.)[35]

Padre Ignazio: One evening, joking with the friars, I made them try the effects or veratridine when it is drawn close to the nose. Padre Pio too, took some, and he had to go back to his cell because he couldn’t stop sneezing.[36]

Padre Ignazio: He is humble. He is humble, I’ll repeat, so much that if not for that, with all that has been going around him…., and he is so obedient.[40]

Mary Bridget Nolan: “It doesn’t happen every day to hear about Angels smiling, crying, driving cars, involved in human events.”[37]

Dorothy Valls: “Padre Pio had such knowledge of the human soul that Freud could learn from him.”Sch87, 143

Padre Alberto: “So many people tell me that Padre Pio is a supernatural being. He is like Christ reincarnated sent by God to stem the evil of people.”[38]

Padre Eusebio: People would go to him not only for confession but with every kind of question you could imagine. And when he after confession had to go upstairs, along the corridor were people after him with more questions. And the same questions by different people got different answers. He never said “Let me think about it.” He had the answer bing, bing, bing, bing. If I should speak like that you would think that I am a madman.[39]

Mons Rossi: He has deeply felt profound humility, and outmost simplicity and indifference, as if nothing had ever occurred around his person. He is generally polite and respectful. [41]

Padre Cherubino: “Padre Pio is very simple, and for this reason he rather needs direction and advice from those around him.”[42]

Padre Romolo: “In my opinion Padre Pio is informal, like a child who would need clear and definite orders in all the areas of his behavior.”[43]

Padre Lorenzo: His humility is remarkable. One cannot suppose the existence in him of duplicity. He is very simple, so that he rather needs direction an advice. He is a little prone to judging his superiors.[44]

Venerable Giocondo Lorgna: “Padre Pio is the most affable, cordial, angelic, obedient. He has healed others and he is always ill.”[45]

Archbishop Adolfo Tortolo: “Padre Pio moved the world and continues[46] to move it.”

Jim Gallagher (at the end of the Biography of Padre Pio that he wrote): “Now I understand what the gospel writer John felt when he wrote: There are many other things that Jesus did. It they were all written down, one by one, I suppose that the whole world could not hold the books that would be written.”[47]

Mons. Raffaele Pellecchia, former Archbishop of Sorrento and Castellammare di Stabia: “The glorification of Padre Pio is the clearest answer that the Church of the Ecumenical Council gives to the modern age, because the joys and the hopes, the sadness and anguishes of humankind today, especially of the poor and of people suffering, were also his joys and hopes, sadness and anguishes. And anything that was genuinely human echoed in his heart.[48]

Health

Padre Rosario da Aliminusa: “Padre Pio always seemed to be at the extreme limits of his strength, and perpetually at the point of death.”[49]

Rev. Bernard Ruffin wrote the book "Padre Pio" the true story."
Rev. Bernard Ruffin: Since childhood Padre was plagued by ill-defined physical problems. He suffered from intestinal irritability, inability to retain solid food for weeks and months on end, spasms of violent coughing, excruciating headaches, and unusually high temperatures. Some days he would seem to be reduced to the point of death, only to recover just as suddenly. In 1908 in Montefusco a doctor made the devastating diagnosis of pulmonary tuberculosis, and he had to be sent home to prevent contagion. At home, Dr. Andrea Cardone refused to give that diagnosis, and suggested to see a specialist in Naples. In Naples the doctors were not able to say what the matter was. He went back to Montefusco, but he was soon seized by violent stomach cramps and persistent vomiting, and had to be sent home again. Each time he returned home he improved. He could not remain a single day at any friary without suffering a relapse. Padre Benedetto obtained for him a dispensation to live at home, with the Capuchin habit, and complete his studies privately. But he started feeling ill even in Pietrelcina. In March of 1910 he had continuous fevers, cough, pain in the chest and back. In April he was confined to bed. In May he had chest pains. In July the pains increased.[50]

In this picture of Padre Pio with his brother Michele, the detail shows the swollen feet of Padre Pio.

Mons. Rossi: “For his studies he went from convent to convent, however, many times the state of his health forced him to go back breathing his native air. He was said to suffer from bronchial pneumonia; in reality, the medical exams never confirmed this positively.”[51]

Padre Luigi: “What I saw is that at times he would fall ill very once in a while, and sweat in an extraordinary manner.”[52] “Padre Pio fell seriously ill on the feast of the Immaculate in 1919, and in May 5, 1920. We thought he was going to die; the rumor had spread that he would die at thirty-three, the age he was about to turn then. Instead, he healed and got better.”[53]

Padre Nazareno in his notes in 1916, when Padre Pio was in Foggia, in St. Anna’s convent: “He got a bad fever of 41C (105.8F) degrees and higher. I called Dr. Del Prete, he found infiltration in both apexes and ordered complete isolation. Dr. Tarallo was called for consultation and he diagnosed the same thing. Both doctors would come every evening to visit Padre Pio. They were puzzled and said this must have been a special disorder, coming and going. The fever stayed for several days and then suddenly disappeared, with great confusion of the doctors. In summary both doctors said that he didn’t have tuberculosis. The same conclusion had been reached by Dr. Cardona in Pietrelcina.” [54] [55] [56]

Fevers

In the old days the body temperature was taken by mercury thermometer, today no longer in common use. Normal body temperature is 98.2°F (or 36.8°C). A temperature at or above about 104 °F (40 °C) requires treatment.

Padre Pio had long bouts of high fevers, inexplicable mystical fevers, followed by normal temperatures.[57]

Padre Pio himself said that at times his temperature rose to 118.4. He said; “that happens when I am ill. But the illness is a moral, rather than a physical, illness"[58] and said it happened when he had “some representation of the Lord”, and seemed like he was "in a furnace, still always conscious".[59]

A friar attested that "even under the strain of this fever, Padre Pio is not knocked down, but gets up, moves about, and can do everything."[60] It is baffling that no delirium or other mental disturbances accompanied such high temperatures.[61]

In the military hospital he continued to suffer fevers with extraordinarily high temperatures. A thing which he and his colleagues in religion had become used to,

On December 1915 at the Trinity Military Hospital in Naples, during the routine physical, Padre Pio's temperature was taken by Dr. Giuseppe Grieco, lieutenant medical doctor in the Italian Army, with an armpit mercury thermometer. In less than one minute the thermometer cracked, having gone over the maximum temperature of 42C (107.6). Three other thermometers cracked the same way. Dr. Grieco called in a colleague dr. Francesco Melle.

They decided to try with a bath thermometer, removed from the casing that could read up to 80C (176F). The thermometer read 48C (118.4).

They couldn't believe it, so they tried with a laboratory precision thermometer. This time the temperature was 49C (120.2).

They decided to inform the captain prof. Dr. Felice D'Onofrio, chief of medical services. He came in, measured again, and the reading was 49C. "This is a mystery. This is impossible. I can't believe my eyes. He should be in agony. This man is either a saint or a devil." He prescribed quinine and went to see him in the morning. He took again the temperature and was 36.7C (98.06). "I don't understand anything. Let's send him home to die in peace." [63] [64]

Dr. Giorgio Festa in 1920 took Padre Pio's temperature as part of his investigation. The reading was 48.5C.

Padre Alberto D’Apolito reported that in 1920 “I would take Padre Pio’s temperature several times and it would register between 46C and 47C (114,8F – 116,6F).[65]

In 1921 Padre Lorenzo, superior of the convent, testified under oath to Mons. Rossi that he was skeptical, and had personally witnessed and recorded Padre Pio with fevers of 43C (109.4F) degrees Fahrenheit, then 45C (113F) degrees, and finally 48C (118.4F) degrees.[66] [67]

San Giovanni Rotondo, February 8, 1917: “I have been sick of pneumonia, with very high fevers.”[68]

The fevers were over 42C, the maximum reached by a normal thermometer, because the thermometers cracked when used on Padre Pio. During a similar episode, on January 27 1917, the superior of the convent, Padre Paolino da Casacalenda, decided to take Padre Pio’s temperature personally. The mercury climbed to 108F degrees, than broke the bulb of the thermometer. Padre Paolino hurried to the bathroom and fetched a bath thermometer, freed it from the wooden sheath, and placed it under Pio’s armpit. The temperature soared to 125.5F degrees.[69] “When I removed the thermometer from the armpit it had reached 52C. Fifty two degrees! Well, I looked at Padre Pio. He didn��t seem in bad shape. I put a hand on his forehead. It was not hat. The color was of somebody who has no fever.”[70] [71]

Padre Dominic Meyer, from Belleville, Illinois was sent in 1947 to the Convent to take care of the more than 250 letters Padre Pio received daily in English and German. He did it for the next thirteen years. He described in September 1949 a bout with "sister fever" in which Padre Pio's temperature was measured by dr. Sanguinetti with a special thermometer as 114F degrees.

Tears

Padre Pellegrino: “When Padre Pio prepared himself for confession, he invoked Our Lady and wept. He cried so many tears that with these alone he could have cancelled all of his sins. Once, he was crying and I told him about it. He said: “So now to cry for my sins I need to ask your permission?”[72]

Padre Eusebio was confessing Padre Pio. When he had finished confessing his sins he burst in tears. Padre Eusebio: “I can’t see any proportion between the sins you have confessed and your display of such pain and sorrow.” Padre Pio: “Son, I am the biggest sinner on this earth!” And he continued to cry sorrowfully.[73]

Padre Antonino testified: “In Sant’Elia a Pianisi, at the time of the common prayers, and especially after Communion, brother Pio shed so many tears that made a little pit in the pavement. We asked him for the reason, and he never told us. One day, since I was his spiritual director, I asked him under obedience, and he said: “I cry for my sins, and the sins of everybody.”[74]

Brother Leo (Fra' Leone) classmate of Padre Pio 1903-8, testified: "While praying, Padre Pio was always crying, silently, and so abundantly that his tears were leaving traces on the stone pavement of the choir. We youngsters made fun of him. So he took the habit of lying on the floor hi large handkerchief in front of him.

After praying he would take the handkerchief that was all wet. You could have squeezed it!"[75] [76]

Padre Placido did the novitiate with Padre Pio in 1902. All the novices had an assigns stall for meditation. They noticed that while meditating, fra’ Pio cried abundantly. One day he and the other novices jokingly asked future Padre Pio: “Why is your place in the choir always wet and ours dry?” Padre Placido reported that from that day on fra’ Pio spread out his large handkerchief on the floor in front to him and it was always soaked with tears.[77]

Dr. Franco Lotti found Padre Pio crying in his room. He asked why he was shedding those tears. “I am crying at the thought of when I will have to be in God’s presence.”[78]

He used to say: "Good works are the fruit of many tears and of a lot of suffering."

Francesco Napolitano: “Padre Pio never failed to cry when he celebrated the Divine Sacrifice.”[79]

“I have committed so many sins! Think that from birth, on May 25, 1887 until vestition, on January 23 1903, I never thanked the Lord for having been baptized so soon, just fourteen hours after birth, at 8:00 AM of May 26. I am an ungrateful wretch.

Eating

Padre Roberto da Nove: Padre Pio eats nothing for breakfast or dinner. Lunch: boiled vegetables, fruit of season, sometimes an egg.[82] Sometimes he has a hot chocolate for dinner.[83] There are periods when he can’t keep anything down: moments when he takes to some food, which later he cannot tolerate.[84]

Padre Romolo da San Marco in Lamis: “He doesn’t eat much. He eats rather sparingly. He eats just a little bit of everything. He eats more or less a third of what I eat.”[86] [87]

Padre Pio to his nephew Mario Pennelli: “In forty years I have not been able to eat even half of a loaf of bread.”[88]

Padre Alberto: “Padre Pio had some very hard biscuits and roasted chick peas in the pantry drawer. Instead of the food brought to him he would put one of those in his mouth, and chew very slowly, giving everyone the impression that he was eating.”

It was truly amazing how he could bear up in the confessional for so many hours without adequate nourishment.”[89] [90]

Dr. Pavone. “Padre Pio ate very little. He used to go once a day to the refectory under obedience. In medical terms the nourishment of Padre Pio was absolutely insufficient. These things are against the natural law; against everything. But they happened.”[91]

Lay Brother Modestino: “Padre Pio ate very little. Some days he ate nothing at all.

On a Christmas day he took an espresso coffee. He said: “It’s Christmas and it’s time to celebrate. Once in a while he enjoyed a slice of pork liver, or artichokes or turnips sent from Pietrelcina”[92] One day he told to brother Modestino: “The greatest favor I could get from the superior would be to dispense me from eating.”[93]

Padre Dominic Meyer: “He also ate macaroni, cheese, peas, beans, fruit, liver, fried sausage, dried ham, and as all good Italians, he drank a glass of wine. But everything was eaten in minute quantities. Frequently he handed much of the food that was served to him to the friar next to him.[94]

Every doctor who observed him eating stated that what he ate was insufficient to keep an adult alive.[95]

Padre Pio said that he was nourished by the sole Eucharist: “It is the Lord who does this and not I. It is the Lord who is working in me.”[96]

Padre Nazareno d’Arpaise: “In Foggia Padre Pio was prepared special meals. He would just taste the food and then pass it to other friars. I asked him: “Piuccio haven’t you tuberculosis?” “Yes?” “Why then you give your food to other friars? Don’t you know that your disease is highly contagious? ““Yes, but my disease, by special disposition of the Lord, is not contagious.”[97] [98]

Sleeping

Padre Pio slept with just a sheet and a light plaid, as he couldn’t stand heavy blankets.[99]

Padre Pio asked a young man how long he had slept the previous night. “Six or seven.” Padre Pio replied: “That’s as much I sleep in one year.”[100]

Padre Pio: “I have great distress in meeting the daily needs of eating, drinking, and sleeping. I do it only because the Lord wants it.”[101]

Padre Raffaele: “In his early priestly life he would get up at 3:00 in the morning. In his later years, generally he would not go to bed at all. When he would go to bed he would put the alarm at three o’ clock. He would only sleep for about three hours at most.”[102]

Padre Eusebio: “He would get up very early in the morning, clean his wounds and start to say the rosary and pray and meditate.”[103]

Padre Roberto da Nove, testified in 1920: “Padre Pio gets up at the same time of the community 5:30 AM. He hears confessions until 10:00 AM, when he celebrates Holy Mass. After Mass, he returns to his cell for the thanksgiving prayer. He then goes down to the sacristy to listen to all those who wish to talk to him and be blessed. They are many and come from all the regions of Italy and from abroad. It takes great patience to listen to so many miseries and to welcome so many sick and desperate souls, who ask for help, confidence, faith, peace. At noon he has lunch in the refectory of the small minor seminary of which he is the spiritual director. His menu consists of boiled vegetables, fruit (when in season), with sometimes an egg. And this is all he eats in one day, since neither in the morning nor in the evening does he take anything else. In the evening he stays a while to converse with the community.”[104]

Padre Raffaele: In his early priestly life he would get up at 3:00 in the morning. He would celebrate Mass whenever his superiors would tell him. Many times his superior had to call him out of the confessional to go to the refectory. Otherwise he would be hearing confessions all the time. He ate only a little. He would just take a nibble. Then, he would hear confessions until the Angelus at 6:00 pm. He never came to supper in the evening. In his later years, generally he would not go to bed at all. After the earthquake of 1939 he slept in an ambulance parked in the friary garden for almost a month. [105]

Mary Ingoldsby: ”Padre Pio wasn’t a literary genius. There is no literary stile in his Letters, although at times he is like a poet, lyrical in the way he launches out into a description. But in his later letters he says things that are literary gems.”[106]

“The halcyon is a little bird that nests on the beach. He builds the nest in a round shape, so tightly compressed, that water cannot permeate it. The nest has an opening on top, so that the little birds can breathe fresh air. The nests are able to float without sinking or filling with seawater. Those little balls never overturn. Your hearts may be similar, tight on every side, so that they are not penetrated by the storms of the world, of the flesh, and of the devil. And there be only the opening on top to breathe and aspirate Jesus.”[107]

“You should be like the oranges of Genoa’s Riviera. They are the whole year full of fruits, flowers, and leaves.”[108]

“It is very easy to row a boat when it is not shaken by winds. But it is very difficult to do it when the winds are blowing.”[109]

“Scruples are like tight shoes. You can’t walk in them. Despise them.”[110]

“Our body is like a donkey. We beat him, but with some consideration. Otherwise he throws himself on the ground and will not carry us anymore.”[111]

"Drowning on high seas or chocking on a glass of water has death as the same outcome."[112] [113]

“With repeated strokes of stone-chisel, and diligent polishing, the divine artist prepares the stones that will be used to build the eternal building.”[114] [115]

“How can a physician heal a sore or a wound if you don’t show it to him?”[116]

"The tall ears of grain are vain and empty; the ones bent to the ground are humble and laden with grain."[117] [118] [119]

“I act as they do at harvest time: they beat the sheaves to separate the wheat from the straw. Then they winnow the wheat to eliminate the straw and leave the wheat behind.”^{^[120]}

"The mom teaches the child walking by supporting him. But later he has to walk by himself."[121]

"Unable to take big steps be content with little steps, until you have the legs to run; or wings to fly."[123]

"As the pearls are held together by the thread, thus the virtues by charity"[125]

“The pearls fall when the thread breaks, thus the virtues are lost if charity diminishes."[126]

“Do not care about tomorrow. Do good deeds today. And when tomorrow comes, it will be called today, and then you will care about it.”[127]

“Be confident in the Providence. Like the people of Israel in the desert, it’s necessary to stock up manna for one day only.”(Ex.16,33).[128]

Pietruccio the blind: “Padre Pio wanted that I confessed every eight days. He used to say: “A housewife who has a beautiful piece of furniture, she dusts it every day. She always finds e speck of dust. We must do the same with our souls.””[129]

To Padre Benedetto, March 26, 1914: “For some time the Lord God has given to my soul very big gifts… To my soul happens what would happen to a poor shepherd if he was introduced to a royal room, where are an endless number of precious things; things that he has never seen before. When the shepherd gets out, he will certainly have in the eyes of his mind all the objects, beautiful and precious, but he will not be able to tell their number, nor to give them their proper name. He would like to tell others of what he has seen; he would collect all of his intellectual and scientific knowledge to do well so; but seeing that all of his efforts wouldn’t be able to have him understood, he prefers better to be silent.”^{^[130]}

Padre Pio’s quips are difficult to translate because they were expressed in the Neapolitan dialect of the countryside and very often was involved a play on words.

Shorts, and short sleeves, even on children, were not accepted around Padre Pio.

To a man going to confession in short sleeves he said: “Either you lengthen the sleeves or shorten your arms.”^{^[131]}

Two nursing students in miniskirts were told that if they wanted to confess to Padre Pio they needed to wear longer clothes. They did, and looking in the mirror one of them said: “We just look like clowns.” When Padre Pio arrived, looking at the line of people waiting, told the friar who was accompanying him: “I am not going to confess those two clowns.”^{^[132]}

A girl in miniskirt was told that a longer dress was needed to confess to Padre Pio. She went to a store with her mom to buy appropriate clothes. Looking at herself in the mirror on a new dress she said: “If my boyfriend could see me he would think I was a clown.” When her turn came and the grate opened she heard: “Go away! I don’t confess clowns.”^{^[133]}

Countess Rina Telfner was wearing a hat. Padre Pio: “Do you think you are prettier with that thing on your head?” She stopped wearing hats.^{^[134]}

In the early days, at least in one occasion, Padre Pio, in good humor, force Padre Paolino, the superior of the convent, to share the responsibility for “making miracles”. A peasant knocked at the friary door. Padre Pio opened, and a peasant asked for “the friar who works miracles”. Padre Pio led him to Padre Paolino’s room and remained outside eavesdropping. The peasant told Padre Paolino: “You know everything. My horse has been stolen. You have to tell me who stole it.” Padre Paolino replied: “The proverb says: ‘He who knows your habits goes in and robs.’” The peasant left, and returned eight days later with a present of cheese for Padre Paolino. He told him: “When I got back home I thought over your words and singled out who could know my habits. I went to his house and said: ‘You stole my horse. The friar that works miracles told me.’ At these words he gave me back my horse.” Padre Paolino would often joke with Padre Pio: “You are not the only one to work miracles.”^{^[135]}

Cleonice Morcaldi told Padre Pio: ‘Padre, you suffer so much because you had the imprudence of offering yourself for the whole humanity’. Padre Pio: “Well, a fool was needed for this.”^{^[136]} ^{^[137]}

In 1916 Padre Pio was talking at a meeting of Franciscan tertiaries at the Ventrella home. A goldfinch in the cage interrupted him with a persistent chirping. Padre Pio said: “Quiet! Listen you too!” The bird stopped, and resumed only when Padre Pio was leaving the meeting.^{^[138]}

Dr. Nicola Centra and several other people were conversing with Padre Pio in the garden on a summer afternoon. They couldn’t hear each other because many birds were singing on the trees. Padre Pio turned towards the trees and said: “Enough now.” Dr. Centra later reported: “The birds obeyed to Padre Pio.”^{^[139]}

A friar offered to Padre Pio a sugared almond. He accepted it and started chewing it. He was then accompanied towards the sacristy to hear the confession of men. When they reached the door he said: “Don’t open the door yet. Let me finish this candy. Otherwise they will say: ‘What kind of saint is this, if he eats candies?’” ^{^[140]}

Carlo Campanini told his doctor in Florence: Tomorrow I'm going to see Padre Pio. The doctor replied: ‘He is a hysterical who got the wound by thinking too much about Jesus on the Cross.’

When Campanini visited Padre Pio, he told him: "When you see your doctor, tell him to think intensely about being an ox. Let's see if he grows horns."^{^[141]}

Padre Bernardo showed a letter to Padre Pio reading the address: “Pio, You need to respect me. They just made me cardinal. The address says ‘His Eminence Padre Bernardo.” Padre Pio’ “You have to respect me more than that, this one beats You”. He showed him an envelope addressed to “Holy Father Pio da Pietrelcina”.^{^[142]}

There was a discussion on who is more important and gets precedence over the other, the doctors or the lawyers. The pope suggested: “Let’s do the same as they do when they hung a person: “Praecedant carnefices, sequantur latrones” As to say: ‘The executioners (doctors) go first, and they are followed by the thieves (attorneys).”"Who enters first, the doctors or the lawyer? The butchers enters first and then the thieves.”^{^[143]}

Carlo Campanini joined the choir, after Padre Pio’s evening prayers, in singing a hymn to Mary. The refrain was ‘To the Heaven I will go to see her one day.” Carlo’s voice was a bit crackling. Back in the sacristy Padre Pio told Carlo: “Hey you, when it comes to getting to Heaven you always have a bit of a struggle don’t you?”^{^[144]}

“Three things are useless: washing a donkey’s head, adding water to the ocean, and preaching to nuns, friars, and priests.”^{^[145]}

Fra Modestino reported: “One day Padre Pio was coming out of the sacristy, and a woman came to him and asked: “Where is the Holy Father?” Padre Pio answered: “The Holy Father is in Rome.” Padre Pio entered the door of the friary and left. The woman asked me: “Were his the Holy Father?” I told her: “You were just talking to him.”^{^[146]}

A priest celebrated Mass and preached the sermon. Padre Pio was in the audience. After Mass he asked Padre Pio: “What do you think of my sermon?” Padre Pio: “Good, but if you kept on much longer you’d be talking to yourself.”^{^[147]}

“What should say to my sister Rose?” “Tell her to become a carnation.”^{^[148]}

“Padre Pio, will you take me to Paradise, even you will have to grab me by the hair?” Padre Pio: “I might need to grab you by the neck, because you will have so little hair!”^{^[149]}

“Frederick Barbarossa (Holy roman Emperor of the 12^th century) went to a monastery and said to the superior: “I will come back a year from now, and if you don’t know the answer to three questions I will destroy your monastery. The first question was: “What is the distance between the earth and the moon?”. The second “What is my worth as an emperor?” The third was: “What I am thinking now?” The superior was desperate, but the cook said to him: “Don’t worry, I will answer those questions.” The year passed, the cook put on the vestments of the superior, and Barbarossa came back. “Do you have the answers?” “Yes, sire.”

“What is the distance?’. The cook gave an enormous cipher. “How do you know?” “I measured it, and if you don’t believe it, measure it yourself.” “All right. What is my worth?” “Judas sold our lord Jesus for thirty pieces of silver. You must be worth a little less than him, let’s say twenty eight.” “All right. Now what am I thinking?” “You are thinking that you are speaking to the superior when instead you are speaking to the cook!”^{^[150]}

Padre Pio used to tell a story: "One day Our Lord making rounds of Paradise saw some strange faces. He asked Peter: Who let these people in? Peter: “Nothing to do with me.” The Lord: 'But you have the key.' Peter: 'There is nothing I can do, and you can't do either.' The Lord: 'What do you mean?' 'It's your mother. Every time she finds my back turned, she opens the gate and lets somebody in.”^{^[151]} ^{^[152]}

“St. Peter saw a man that should not have been in Paradise. He asked: “Who let you in?” The man answered: “St. Joseph did.” St. Joseph told St. Peter: “He was a carpenter, so I let him in.” St. Peter: “No exceptions, he has to leave.” St. Joseph: “If that is the case, Mary get the child and let’s leave.” St. Peter, afraid to lose them said: “Did you say carpenter? Now I remember. There is an exception for carpenters!”^{^[153]} ^{^[154]}

A drunken looking at a caterpillar: “Oh Lord, why did you give so many feet to this little thing, and only two to me who am unable to stand?”^{^[155]} ^{^[156]}

When Padre Pio had to be operated of hernia in 1925, he refused anesthesia. Dr. Festa convinced him to take a little glass of Benedictine liqueur. He did reluctantly have a sip of it. When asked to drink a little more of it, he told dr. Festa: “That’s enough, otherwise we will have a confrontation between the Benedictine and the Capuchin.”^{^[157]}

Padre Pio had not been feeling well and the friars tried to convince him to go some few days inpatient in Casa Sollievo. He said: “What do you think the doctors know!” “But you have created a hospital!” “Yes, but the hospital is for sick people, not for the doctors!”^{^[158]} ^{^[159]}

One day after lunch padre Pio said to Padre Costantino Capobianco: ‘You hear better than usual. Do you have a device?” Padre Costantino replied that indeed he was wearing a hearing aid. Padre Pio: “Take it off. Let me see it.” When he got it in his hand Padre Pio said to the other friars : “Come on, boys. This is the right time to talk bad about padre Costantino. He can’t hear now!”^{^[160]} ^{^[161]} ^{^[162]}

At the confessional: “Father I have only committed light sins.” Padre Pio: “Did you weigh them on the pharmacist’s scale?”^{^[163]}

A woman told Padre Pio that her doctor had recommended for her shock treatment. Padre Pio: "If you are not crazy already, you surely will be after shock treatments."^{^[164]}

When doctors Festa and Romanelli did a joint examination of Padre Pio’s wounds in 1920, Padre Pio didn’t lose its jovial attitude and told them a question and answer joke: "What is like a sick person in between two doctors? He is like a mouse between two cats!"^{^[165]} ^{^[166]} ^{^[167]}

Reported by Dr. Festa: A colleague of mine asked Padre Pio : "Why the lesions are here and not in other parts of the body?" Answer: "You are a doctor. You should tell me why they should have been in other parts of the body and not here."^{^[168]} ^{^[169]} ^{^[170]} The colleague of dr. Festa was dr. Bignami.^{^[171]} ^{^[172]}

The king was coming to inspect, and the recruit was prepared by the sergeant: The King will ask you 3 questions: how old are you? Answer 22.

How long have you been in the army? Answer 2. Whom you like most, your king or your country? Answer: both. The king came and asked the recruit: How many years have you been in the army? 22. How old are you? 2. The king got frustrated and said: Either of us is stupid. The recruits answer: “Both your majesty."^{^[173]} ^{^[174]}

“Padre my leg is not doing well.” “Lucky you! I have both legs in bad shape.”^{^[175]} ^{^[176]}

Padre Isidoro told Padre Pio: “I have to go inpatient in Casa Sollievo because it has been a month now that I have atrocious headaches. Pray for me.” Padre Pio laughed. Padre Isidoro came back to Padre Pio after a week. He was all smiles. “They didn’t find anything in my head”. Padre Pio: ‘That is something that we all knew already.”^{^[177]}

During a lightning a friar told Padre Pio: "Father let’s move away from the transformer. Ten people were killed yesterday. "We ran no risk of this. There are only two of us."^{^[178]} ^{^[179]}

“Do you know why you doctors never go on strike? Because if you go on strike people will realize that, without you, they get better, and faster.”^{^[180]}

Padre Pio was celebrating a wedding, and the groom was so emotional that he has unable to say “Yes”. Padre Pio asked several times and then added: “Well, when are you going to say yes? Perhaps you want me to marry her?”^{^[181]}

“Father, my friend asked me to tell you that she has not been feeling well for the past two years. What should I tell her?” “Tell her that I have not been feeling well for the past seventy years.”^{^[182]}

A farmer who had never traveled was about to take the train for the first time. At the counter: “Where are you going?” “It’s not your business.” “But I need to know it to issue a ticket.” After a long arguing he bought a round trip ticket. The train started moving, and when it entered a long dark tunnel he got terribly scared. He asked: “Where are we going?” “We are going to hell” was the answer. The man: “I am not worried. I have a roundtrip ticket.”^{^[183]} ^{^[184]}

In 1959 Padre Pio was show the newly built church of Santa Maria delle Grazie, just before the inauguration on July 1^{s t}. The church was several times larger than the original church, and to everybody’s surprise Padre Pio was not impressed and called it “a mousetrap”. He said “Ma che avete fatto. Nu mastrillo? Doveva essere piu’ grande, molto piu’ grande.” “What did you make? A mousetrap? It should have been bigger, much bigger.” In other occasion he called it “a matchbox”^{^[185]}

Padre Costantino Capobianco witnessed this whole episode. The superior Padre Carmelo ordered to install an air conditioning box, donated by a benefactor, in Padre Pio’s room, while he was in the confessional. When Padre Pio went back to his room asked what that was, and how much it cost, and said: “This in an offence against poverty. What will the Seraphic Father Saint Francis say?” These words were said to Padre Tarcisio, who replied: “Padre, it’s not your fault. The superior decided so against your will. With your attitude you make people lose peace.” Then Padre Pio looked at Padre Costantino and asked: “What do you say?” Padre Costantino: “Padre Tarcisio is right. You didn’t want it. If there is a fault is certainly not yours.” Padre Pio never turned it on. It became an extra shelf for little objects.^{^[186]}

Padre Joseph Pius, Bill Martin before becoming a Capuchin friar: ”Once I heard that Padre Sexto said to him: “I wish you another fifty years.” Padre Pio replied: “What harm I have ever done to you?”^{^[187]}

Padre Pio walking in the church saw a bricklayer carrying stuff downstairs in the crypt, working on Padre Pio’s tomb. He asked: “What are you making?” The man was extremely embarrassed and said: “I don’t know; maybe an altar.” Padre Pio: ‘Remember that I will spend very little time down there.”

Padre Pio was asked what he thought of the tomb they were building for him. “I think that it’s a bit smallish and I will not have much air to breath.”