Padre
Pio loved people, loving them truly as God's children
and as his own brothers and sisters. For this reason
he devoted much of his life to prayer and became
"the scapegoat" of his fellow-beings to
ensure their spiritual well-being. In order to soothe
physical pain and wounds, he set up his very own
"cathedral of charity" known as the "House
for the Relief of Suffering".
San Giovanni Rotondo had no hospital facilities
as such. Thus Padre Pio had great pleasure when
the premises of the former St. Clare's convent were
turned into a small nursing home. "Saint Francis'
civil Hospital" was opened on 25 January 1925
and comprised two wards with seven beds each, as
well as two rooms where the poor could be nursed
free of charge. However, following major damage
caused by an earthquake in 1938, the nursery home
was closed down thirteen years later and its premises
were subsequently refurbished and used as a kindergarten.
Yet Padre Pio's idea of charity outlived the destruction
caused by the earthquake: on the evening of 9 January
1940, the friar came up with the idea for a "House
for the Relief of Suffering". Padre Pio's children
in faith promptly joined in on the idea and the
first stone of what was to become the "cathedral
of charity" was laid at the end of the war,
on 16h May 1947.
The wards were opened on 26 July 1954 and the blood
bank was established on 5 November. The entire complex
was officially opened on 5 May 1956 with a live
transmission of the blessing by Pope Pious XII.
Padre Pio himself presented the "child of Providence
" to the crowd with these words: "A seed
has been sown in the ground which the Lord God shall
warm with the rays of His love … What you see before
you is only the earliest stage of this undertaking
… one stage of our journey through life has been
completed. Let us not lose momentum. Let us answer
God's call for the sake of goodness, with all us
doing our duty: I myself through the unending prayers
of a humble servant of our Lord Jesus Christ; you
through the burning desire to hold the whole of
suffering humanity close to your breast, to present
it through me to the grace of our Heavenly Father."
.
Padre Pio's Spirituality
Spiritual
school
"Let
us always trust in God, and may our lively faith and the comfort of Christian
hope assist us in this. We must pray continually, moreover, that peace may soon
smile on the nations. We should turn our thoughts to heaven, our true homeland,
of which our earthly country is but a dim image, and make every effort with the
divine assistance to preserve at all times, amidst happy or sad events, the cheerful
calm that becomes the true followers of the fair Nazarene" (Epist. I,
p. 596)
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