THE PHENOMENON THAT IS PADRE PIO IN POLAND

By the time I will publish my book on Padre Pio, I will have spent over 4 years working on it. At 500 pages, my book is quite a tome.

I have not written such a long book in blindness; books on Padre Pio that are comprehensive and good quality tend to outsell the more succinct, niche books on Pio that have a moment in the sun before they are more usually sought out by people who want to know about one side of Pio or about one period in his life. That said, I have bought all the niche books on Pio and I am in the debt of many authors who have slavishly researched particular areas of his life. And maybe my book will sell poorly and buck the trend.   

But when I was researching my book, I came across a few ideas for books on Pio, books I will never write but which I would like to make known. This post is a pitch for a book on the dramatic explosion of interest in Padre Pio that is happening in Poland.

For starters, in Polska the number of "Padre Pio prayer groups" is starting to multiplying at a dizzying rate. Few people know that in Padre Pio's lifetime he founded a movement for prayer groups and he set out careful guidelines (each group has to be under the watchful eye of a faithful priest). On September 22nd, 1968, the day before Pio died, there was a convention for all the prayer groups held in his home of San Giovanni Rotondo and thousands upon thousands of people flooded the town.

Modern day Poland is home to an explosion of Padre Pio prayer groups. Even in tiny hamlets and villages there are the "Padre Pio prayer groups" and in larger towns and cities a pattern is developing where many of the prayer groups become so big that they divide into smaller prayer groups that then become so big that they divide again... A usual development is that if there are, let's say 15 people in a prayer group, it is not beyond the bounds that every member of the group goes in search of other souls to whom they introduce Padre Pio, these souls join up, and often want to form groups of their own. A great many of them are Millennials and many are Generation Z, and even those in their late teens describe themselves as spiritual sons and daughters of Pio. Their stories are not all alike, and the unique intervention of Pio in their lives would make for an enthralling read.

To be sure there are many unlikely conversion stories; young people brought up in anti-Catholic households who develop an uncannily strong attraction to Padre Pio, and even have mystical experiences where Pio reaches out to them. More often, they are invited to pray at a prayer group by a peer of theirs. They are impressive in their sincerity, but also their numbers which are multiplying beyond all expectations, except when you consider that this growing movement of Polish spiritual children of Pio is part of one of a most extraordinary prophecy concerning Padre Pio. Ah, the prophecy! This grand prophecy holds that it will be a Franciscan, one of St Francis' fold who will lead a third of the world to Christ. Padre Pio tacitly agreed it was him, and even took issue with it, arguing that he did not want merely a third. I wrote about it in the same post where I described Pio's greatest mystical experience: when Jesus took Pio's heart and submerged it in His Sacred Heart and the two hearts beat as one and most notably shared the same function. 

This isn't my story or news article or book, but it may be yours. I am not in a position to travel to Poland even once, and I do not have the necessary passion for the recent history of the country. Yet it is a priority of mine to have my book on Pio translated into Polish. In my own book I have done an analysis of the guidelines set forth by Pio as to how to ensure the prayer groups are successful.

By way of job spec, I would suggest that the ideal author to write the story of Padre Pio and Poland has a fascination and a great affection for Polish Catholicism in all its colorful forms that defies the common stereotype of the blue-eyed Eastern European from a devout family who reveres John Paul II. As I hinted above, some of the spiritual children come from homes that are virulently anti-Catholic, and those who are Generation Z do not have any memories of the JP II pontificate but they are pleasantly surprised to hear Pio confided in JP II that his shoulder wound was the most painful. If the author is not Polish, then the author would need a working knowledge of Polish and have a translator. T'would be good if the author had a facility with numbers, accounting and statistics because a tenet of this book would be to demonstrate how vast swathes of the Polish population are spiritual children or are actively seeking to become spiritual children and paint a remarkable numerical portrait of a country that is fast becoming a living proof of the prophecy that Pio will lead a third of the world to Christ.

If anyone out there decides to run with this, there is no need to report back to me, or even give me credit for this hot tip. Whoever you are, I wish you all the best in your mission of researching and writing this book.

Dearest Readers, You may also like to learn of how a photograph of Padre Pio chased away demons that were flying at a man on his death-bed.