# 46 of 80 - THIS HAPPY BOOK REPORT ON PADRE PIO

# 46 OF 80 -THIS HAPPY BOOK REPORT ON PADRE PIO

IN PURSUIT OF THE TRUTH - HTTP://WWW.CINOPSBEGONE.BLOGSPOT.COM - TUES. MAY 12,2020

 

Chapter 22 - 'The Lord Is Not Moved to Pity' p. 248 -250 ---- selected excerpts

"According to one of his spiritual sons, "At the beginning, Padre Pio seemed happy with Fascism. Then he changed his mind." First of all, he was repelled by the coercive tactics eventually adopted by Benito Mussolini to force his countrymen into joining the party.

 

Pio told an American."It reached the point that you couldn't get sugar, flour, or oil without a Fascist card. It was blackmail. Even the children's book were full of propaganda. What soured Padre Pio most against Mussolini was his alliance, in October 1936, with Germany. Pio feared and despised Hitler because of his "religion of blood" and because of his virulent hatred of Christianity.

 

To a priest friend Pio remarked, "Do you know what I would do with Hitler if I could get my hands on him? I would put him in a cage everywhere throughout the world so that Hitler would know what people were saying about him. As war engulfed Europe and much of he world in 1940, Padre Pio was very depressed. "Don't you remember, along about 1920 or 1921," he reminded Padre Agostino, "I predicted that the League of Nations wouldn't last? I told you. 'These nations are going to tear each other to pieces.' Well, look, it's happening.'

 

As German troops rampaged through Europe in 1940, with Mussolini at Hitler's coattails, many Italians - including some of the Capuchins - were optimistic that soon Italy would take a proud place in the new order that would be established in the world. For practical as well as theological reasons, Padre Pio vigorously disagreed. When Germany invaded Russia in 1941, Pio (along with many other people) was convinced that eventual defeat was a certainty for the Axis.

 

To confreres still sanguine about eventual victory, Padre Pio is said to have commented, "Don't you realize how big Russia is? Can a fly swallow an elephant? He insisted that the Lord would never allow a man as diabolical as Hitler to win. This was the subject of an argument he had with a Capuchin bishop who insisted that the Axis deserved to win and would. "No, we won't win!" Pio said authoritatively. "I don't see how we could possibly achieve victory when [Hitler] goes against the Pope and publicly blasphemes the Madonna!... Excellency, we won't win! And if we were to win, victory will be given us as a punishment!"

 

To an American official he commented, "To win the war would not mean that we won it, but that Germany won. Then we would fall under Nazi slavery, which is the most diabolical slavery that one can imagine!" He seemed to fear Nazism more than Communism... By 1943 the tide was turning. A desperate Mussolini sent messengers to Padre Pio, requesting his prayers for Italy. "So, now, you come to me, after you have destroyed Italy!" Pio fumed. "You can tell Mussolini that nothing can save Italy now!Nothing! Tell him, "You have destroyed her!"...

 

As for San Giovanni Rotondo, Padre Pio predicted that it would be untouched by the fighting. "The Lord, through His infinite goodness, will spare this blessed place." ... The American officer in charge at Bari heard they had a munitions dump in or near San Giovanni Rotondo. So he called his officers .. and said he would lead the first plane. He was a Protestant. When he neared San Giovanni Rotondo he saw high in the air, ahead of the plane, a monk with arms outstretched as if to ward off his coming. He ordered the formation to return to base and drop the bombs in an open field.... he related to what he had seen. 

 

An Italian officer present told him there was a monk there whom the people consider a saint. Probably he was the one the General saw in the heavens. The general determined to find out. He and another came here and together they went to the sacristy ... to watch as the fathers came down for Mass. He immediately recognized Padre Pio as the one he had seen in the air in front of his plane....

 

There are different versions. The Capuchin Fernando of Riese Pio X insists of occurrences of many sightings, "confirmed by a number of pilots in the Anglo-American air forces, of various nationalities (English, American, Polish, Palestinian) and of various religions (Catholic, Orthodox, Muslim, Protestant, Jewish).".... 

George H. Kubeck