Padre Pio

Padre Pio is known in part for his prophetic ability, his healing power and receiving the stigmata. But during his life and after his death, ...

[extremely low self-esteem](https://www.mysticsofthechurch.com/2012/01/teresa-musco-stigmatic-mystic-victim.html) and [anorexia](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/49614186_Holy_Stigmata_Anorexia_and_Self-Mutilation_Parallels_in_Pain_and_Imagining) or inedia (including consuming only the Eucharist). Van Osselaer](https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1163/j.ctv1sr6h7z.8) writes, “the bodies of the stigmatics not only referred to that of Christ and of stigmatized predecessors, but also symbolized the current state of society—they referred to both the past and the present.” Some bore similar wounds to other saints after they had heard their stories. [Magdalena de la Cruz](https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07698b.htm), who admitted on her deathbed that she faked the wounds. He was able to bilocate, according to the testimony of [Padre Carmelo Durante](https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/padre-pios-bilocation-and-the-odor-of-sanctity-13853), the superior of Padre Pio’s community in 1954, and it was said he was in the town healing people or attending meetings while being simultaneously in the friary. Saints or blesseds with the stigmata have been canonized or beatified because of their holy deeds and other works attributed to them, not because of their stigmata alone. Some note that the beginning of the era in which the church has a record of people claiming to experience the stigmata aligns with the period in church history when the church embraced with special emphasis the recognition of the humanity of Jesus, especially as he was on the cross. Catherine of Siena](https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14294b.htm), on the other hand, received the stigmata during one Lent, but it was [visible only to herself](https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198795643.003.0005), yet she is said to have felt the pain of the marks. Lidwina](https://aleteia.org/2018/02/16/meet-st-lidwina-the-patron-saint-of-ice-skating/) was paralyzed; [Bl. He is said to have borne the marks of the nails of the crucifixion on his hands and feet, and the wound from the lance in his side. Catherine de’ Ricci suffered a similar [“ecstasy of the Passion”](https://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=587) weekly from Thursday at noon until Friday at 4 p.m.) She had been [ill and paralyzed](https://passionist.org/saint-gemma-galgani/) when she was 19, and two years later, in 1899, after years of praying for a cure, she received a vision in which the wounds of Jesus were on fire before they then touched her as well. Francis, the stigmata appeared when he received a vision of an angel crucified, and the wounds then appeared on his own body.