When Francesco expressed his desire to his parents, they made a trip to Morcone, a community 13 miles (21 km) north of Pietrelcina, to find out if their son was eligible to enter the Order.

[8] Francesco's father went to the United States in search of work to pay for private tutoring for his son, to meet the academic requirements to enter the Capuchin Order.

On 22 January, he took the Franciscan habit and the name of Fra (Friar) Pio, in honour of Pope Pius I, whose relic is preserved in the Santa Anna Chapel in Pietrelcina.

He moved to an agricultural community, Our Lady of Grace Capuchin Friary, located in the Gargano Mountains in San Giovanni Rotondo in the Province of Foggia.

[21] In the next months, his reputation of sainthood grew rapidly in the region of San Giovanni Rotondo, attracting hundreds of believers at the monastery coming each day to see him.

[23] According to Luzzatto, the bulk of the money for financing the hospital came directly from Emanuele Brunatto, a keen follower of Pio, who had made his fortune in the black market in German-occupied France.

[44] In a letter to his spiritual companion and confessor Father Agostino Gemelli, dated 21 March 1912, Pio wrote of his devotion to the mystical body of Christ and the intuition that he would bear the stigmata.

[14] In a 1915 letter, Agostino asked Pio specific questions, including: when did he first experience visions, whether he was stigmatic, and whether he felt the pains of the Passion of Christ, namely the crowning of thorns and the scourging.

[53] Pio maintained that the carbolic acid was used to sterilize syringes used for medical treatments and that after being subjected to a practical joke where veratrine was mixed with snuff tobacco, causing uncontrollable sneezing after ingestion, he decided to acquire his own quantity of the substance in order to play the same joke on his confreres;[54][55] the bishop of Volterra, Raffaele Rossi came to share this view, believing that "Instead of malice, what is revealed here is Padre Pio's simplicity, and his playful spirit",[55] and that "the stigmata at issue are not a work of the devil, nor a gross deceit, a fraud, the trick of a devious and malicious person [...] his 'stigmata' do not seem to me a morbid product of external suggestion.

Austrian Cardinal Alfons Stickler reported that Wojtyła confided to him that during this meeting, Pio told him he would one day ascend to "the highest post in the church, though further confirmation is needed.

[67] John Paul's secretary, Stanisław Dziwisz, denies the prediction,[68] while George Weigel's biography Witness to Hope, which contains an account of the same visit, does not mention it.

[79] In his report to the Holy Office of 1925, Festa arrived at a benevolent verdict and attacked Gemelli's critical view of Pio's stigmata, with theological arguments playing the lead role.

[80] In 1920, Father Agostino Gemelli – a physician and psychologist – was commissioned by Cardinal Rafael Merry del Val to visit Pio and carry out a clinical examination of the wounds.

"For this reason, despite having gone to Gargano Peninsula on his own initiative, without being asked by any ecclesiastical authority, Gemelli did not hesitate to make his private letter to the Holy Office a kind of unofficial report on Padre Pio.

[84] The Bishop of Volterra, Raffaele Rossi, Carmelite, was formally commissioned on 11 June 1921, by the Holy Office to make a canonical inquiry concerning Pio.

"[57] As for the chest, it says: "In his side, the sign is represented by a triangular spot, the colour of red wine, and by other smaller ones, not anymore, then, by a sort of upside-down cross such as the one seen in 1919 by Dr. Bignami and Dr.

At the beginning of his tenure, he learned that Father Pio's opponents had placed listening devices in his monastery cell and confessional, recording his confessions with tape.

[90] Outside his semi-official journal, John XXIII wrote on four sheets of paper that he prayed for "PP" (Padre Pio) and the discovery by means of tapes, if what they imply is true, of his intimate and indecent relationships with women from his impenetrable praetorian guard around his person pointed to a terrible calamity of souls.

[90] John XXIII had probably never listened to the tapes himself, but assumed the correctness of this view: "The reason for my spiritual tranquillity, and it is a priceless privilege and grace, is that I feel personally pure of this contamination that for forty years has corroded hundreds of thousands of souls made foolish and deranged to an unheard-of degree.

[98] Following Maccari's Apostolic Visitation, John XXIII noted in his diary that he sees Father Pio as a "straw idol" (idolo di stoppa).

[101] He taught his spiritual followers that suffering is a special sign of God's love, for it makes you "resemble His divine son in His anguish in the desert and on the hill of Calvary.

"[103] Pio also held to strict rules concerning modesty, and refused confession to women who did not wear skirts that extended a minimum of 8 inches (20 cm) past the knees.

Pio informed the pope that he would offer up his daily prayers and suffering for the pontiff, due to Paul VI's defence of "eternal truth, which never changes with the passing of years.

Beginning in 1990, the Congregation for the Causes of Saints debated how Padre Pio had lived his life, and in 1997 Pope John Paul II declared him venerable.

[122] In his homily, John Paul II mentioned Padre Pio's stigmata and his mystical gifts:[123] "His body, marked by the 'stigmata', showed forth the intimate bond between death and resurrection which characterizes the paschal mystery.

Pio of Pietrelcina shared in the Passion with a special intensity: the unique gifts which were given to him, and the interior and mystical sufferings which accompanied them, allowed him constantly to participate in the Lord's agonies, never wavering in his sense that 'Calvary is the hill of the saints'.

[124] After further consideration of Padre Pio's virtues and ability to do good even after his death, John Paul II promulgated the decree of canonization on 28 February 2002.

In 1947, as a young priest studying in Rome, Karol Wojtyła made a pilgrimage to San Giovanni Rotondo to meet Padre Pio in person.

He visited the Santa Maria delle Grazie Church to venerate of the relics of Padre Pio in the crypt, celebrated Mass and met with various people, including with the sick and the employees of the Casa Sollievo della Sofferenza.

[137] Cardinal José Saraiva Martins, Prefect for the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints, celebrated Mass for 15,000 devotees on 24 April at the Shrine of Holy Mary of Grace, San Giovanni Rotondo, before the body went on display in a crystal, marble, and silver sepulcher in the crypt of the monastery.