(1887 -1903 / 1909 -1916)

Padre Pio, who was baptised Francesco Forgione, was born in this small farming town in the province of Benevento on 25 May 1887. Many years after he had left his home town, Padre Pio could still recall it "stone for stone". "My home town is in my heart," he wrote to his brother, Michele, on 22 January 1926. "The Holy Family" is the name he chose for the Capuchin church (which was inaugurated in 1926). From the account made by an eyewitness around 1909, we learn that during one of the walks that the young seminarists used to take in the area near today's monastery the young Capuchin (still Brother Pio at the time) made them stop and asked them to be quiet and listen to what he said he could hear. He could hear a choir of angels and bells ringing out far and wide from a place not far from him, and he pointed towards the deserted road." .