Padre Pio statue in Mamore Gap, Donegal, Ireland.
In June 2002, this life-size statue of Padre Pio was erected and blessed in the Gap of Mamore, and it faces a shrine of Our Lady. It was finished just in time for Padre Pio's canonisation ceremony in Rome. During that summer, in honour of the 'new' saint, St. Pio, the people of Donegal organised for the Rosary to be said by the site of this statue of St. Pio.
I had the privilege of tracing my heritage in Ireland in 2003. I visited the house of a man known to the locals as, "The Master". John O'Dowd had been a school teacher on the Kerry Peninsula near Castle Gregory. He was a bit of a legend for his work in the classroom and his hard work to preserve the Irish culture.
ReplyDeleteYou can imagine my thrill when I learned where he had lived and I could peer inside and see where this legendary relative had made his home.
Well, I looked into the window at the desk where he did so much of his writing and there, front and center....
A prayer card of Padre Pio !
Praise God, I can see the prayer card in my memory as I write this!
I just came across this video footage of Padre Pio (on an Irish blog). You may already know it, but, in case you or your readers haven't seen it, I thought I'd post a link to it:
ReplyDeletehttp://breathingwithbothlungs.blogspot.com/2010/11/rare-footage-of-padre-pio.html