Word: pio
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Minister has already said a chunk of his August vacation will be spent near the decidedly less glamorous L'Aquila, continuing efforts to rebuild the city (and his image) after the April earthquake. Some have even suggested that he may make a pilgrimage to the revered Italian saint Padre Pio as a way to respond to Catholic criticism of his behavior. Can you say Santo Silvio? (See pictures of Padre Pio's saintly return...
...pictures of Padre Pio's saintly return...
...kind of "popular piety" that has built up around Padre Pio and other Church figures and relics, with its promise of special powers and healing the sick, is seen by some critics as veering toward superstition. Benedict has not condemned it, but he has made a point of slowing the output of his predecessor's so-called "saint factory," which during John Paul's 26-year papacy produced hundreds of canonizations...
Close observers of Benedict, however, argue that his focus on reconciling reason and faith does not favor one over the other. While he may not dwell on the popular Padre Pio, the Pope, explains Raphaela Schmid, a Rome-based German philosopher and student of Ratzinger's writings, recognizes that Catholicism's more popular manifestations and the religion's search for an intellectual basis "both have a place in the Church." Schmid says that Benedict has explained why it is "not irrational" to venerate the saints, or believe in miracles. "What you see in this is the language of the heart...
...kind of devotion that Padre Pio's followers display is not excluded in the Ratzinger recipe for spreading the gospel. Indeed such open-hearted faith, and saint worship itself, is intrinsic to the Pope's message. He wrote of saints in his last encyclical, Spe Salvi or "Saved by Hope." In his recently completed visit to the United States, the saints were the focus of his talk to young people and seminarians in Yonkers, New York. "Fix your gaze on our saints. The diversity of their experience of God's presence prompts us to discover anew the breadth and depth...