{"id":8623,"date":"2017-07-09T00:35:35","date_gmt":"2017-07-09T00:35:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/?p=8623"},"modified":"2017-06-21T00:41:16","modified_gmt":"2017-06-21T00:41:16","slug":"padre-pio-brush","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/padre-pio-brush\/","title":{"rendered":"A brush with Padre Pio"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

from\u00a0spiritdaily.com<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

By Michael H. Brown<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n

A brush with Padre Pio<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 During a trip to Italy in 1991 when I was researching a book called The Final Hour<\/em><\/span><\/a><\/span>,\u00a0 I decided to visit San Giovanni Rotundo, the town where Padre Pio, the famous Catholic mystic, had spent most of his life and was now buried. I’ll never forget it because I was on the other side of Italy, at a town called Oliveto Citra, and I didn’t set out until about eight p.m., which meant I had to cross the country and wouldn’t be there until the middle of the night.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It was a Saturday and I had no hotel reservations.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 That was taking a huge chance, because pilgrims flooded San Giovanni on the weekends.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I prayed for a room.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I planned to go to Bosnia-Hercegovina the following day, and because there was a war going on there, I wanted to xerox my notes. I had been to a number of other places and had valuable research that needed to be copied in the event that Serbian forces confiscated my belongings. I wanted to mail a copy home before I took a ferry across the Adriatic.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 That was my second quandary: where was I going to find a copy center? It would be Sunday when I got to San Giovanni, and anyway it wasn’t exactly the type of place where you’ll find a Kinko’s. I prayed to find a place where I could xerox.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 My third prayer was money. I was on an extended trip with limited cash and I had overspent by about $20 the day before when I had bought a small statue for my mother, money I wanted to make up to keep the budget. I even prayed for that.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I set out and drove through the night and when I got to San Giovanni my worst fears began to materialize. There were no rooms. I tried hotel after hotel. They were all full and in some cases weren’t even answering the door.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Hotel after hotel. Middle of the night. Sorry, no vacancy. I was beginning to think I would be sleeping in the little car I had rented. I got to the last hotel and no one answered.\u00a0 I knocked again on the glass door that led to the lobby, and finally a sleepy-eyed clerk slowly approached. It was obvious I had interrupted his sleep. Sorry, he said, no more rooms.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 But then he thought a moment. I can still see the clerk, a young dark-haired Italian, in my mind’s eye. He stood there, contemplated something quickly, and in broken English said, “Wait a minute. I am not going to be going back to sleep, so you can use the room we clerks use. It has a bed but no bathroom.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Because it didn’t have full facilities, he said he would give it to me for $20 less than standard price.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I was elated, thankful that God– no doubt with some intercession from Padre Pio — had answered my prayer. I trudged up the hall and opened the door. <\/span><\/p>\n

There was no bathroom but there was a bed, a desk, a chair — and a xerox machine.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

from\u00a0spiritdaily.com By Michael H. Brown A brush with Padre Pio \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 During a trip to Italy in 1991 when I.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[108,43,40],"tags":[950,184],"class_list":{"0":"post-8623","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-archives","7":"category-inspiration","8":"category-miracles","9":"tag-michael-personal-experience","10":"tag-padre-pio","11":"entry"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8623","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8623\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spiritdaily.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}