Holiness and Sanctity Today - September 23, 2023 St. Padre Pio

Today we celebrate St. Padre Pio - St. Pius of Pietrelcina, a capuchin priest of OFM.  He died when I was a toddler, in 1968.  However, I have heard about him as a child. The most popular Christian magazine in Keralam, Sathyadeepam, had a series of articles on Padre Pio. To me, they did not make a very interesting reading, but they were a report on the miraculous experiences, especially of stigmata, that he was having. 

This was in the late 60s. Ordained a priest at the early age of 22, he devoted 6 decades of his life for pastoral services - mainly confession, counselling, celebrating the eucharist, and healing people... He became famous globally among the Christians of Catholic fold for (the grace of) stigmata. The first ordained priest to have had such a grace! He was raised to the honours of the altar by St. John Pual II. 

Is such sanctity possible today? 

The life of Padre Pio gives us the confidence that even in the era of economic progress and modernity, sanctity is a possibility.  And sanctity, in very simple terms, is to follow Christ who went about doing good (Acts 10:38). 

Lord grant me the grace to grow in sanctity to which we all have been called, doing good around me, thus spreading the goodnews of your unlimited goodness, as St. Padre Pio did.