A bogus holy man?
Well now I've heard everything.

There are obvious holes in this story. Lets nail it ASAP!

This can't be right. The Pope is Infallible!!

I thought he was in the vatican!!!

A fairy tale, made up to sell a book! Don't poison innocent minds!!

1) The Turin Shroud shows Christ's wrists punctured.

2) Padre Pio's 'punctures' were on the palm of his hands. (He also had the 'gift' of bi-location -that's when you can be at two places at once!).

A wee bit of confusion there but details like this don't matter - eh?

6 - alternatively, the Turin Shroud shows 1) Christ's 2) Leonardo's 3) Jacque du Molay's wrists punctured.
You pays your money and you makes your choice...

But the Turin shroud is also fake. It was carbon dated to around the 14th century, I think.

#4 Suck. No the pope's not infallible, he's probably incommunicado. The climate's much better.

There have been scores of tests done to Padre Pio while he was alive and an acid test is the first thing the docs test for. This is one great hoax of a book and I wouldn't entertain or waste another thought about it.

St Pio cured hundreds if not thousands of people. To now come up with a book and say he was basically a sadist all 50 years of his life is stupid, to say the least.

#10 Well, you're making sure of your place up there amongst the fluffy clouds:-)

Maybe John Paul was drinking carbolic acid.

My pious friend of the no. 10 - I agree with you 100%: Padre Pio was not a sadist, no way. He was a masochist.

Scribes...Is there a need for the Catholic Church in the developed world?

"Whads the Stig-mata with you ? hey ! gota no respect ? hey! " Sorry to the serious posters above but I had to ! its almost Friday-here! In answer to #7 I heard the fire they lit under Jacque Du Moley was kept low on purpose to stop him fainting! an relit many times till the crowd dispersed! Medi-evil? or just evil?

#9 "Stigmata, my ar*e"
I'm no theologian, but if that's where it is, I'm not sure it counts as stigmata...

AJ of Fife

You ARE naughty today.

Since he slept with his disciples - NOT in the same bed, in the same room - does this mean, because they were mostly of the same ag,e that they helped each other to relieve the "pressure" of these "raging stonkers".

This is of great theological import and has to be resolved by the Holy Mother Church soonest!

TCW,

In some quarters, it has been suggested that a group of young men cavorting about the countryside, turning water into wine and washing each others feet, is camp in the extreme!

Personally, I think Jesus was bi-sexual and liked nothing better than a romp with Mary M and John!

When do our friends from the US Bible Belt come on-line?

The 3 wise men are looking for a name that will suit the new Messiah! How about "Dave" one says? nah! "too common "he says.What about "Cecil" he asks ? nah too gay! he says.What about "Mohammad" he asks?" nah already taken he says.So as the 3 wise men leave the pub the tall one at the back bangs his head on the door frame an lets out a loud "JESUS CHRIST" to which the other two say "Now theres a name"!!!!

Any chance he may have been disenfecting the wounds or is this too obvious?

Why has my post at #9 been deleted?? What did I do wrong THIS TIME?? Am I to be Scaramouched???

#23 "Am I to be Scaramouched???"
I don't know. Will you do the Fandango?

Sorry.

Any person who believes in stigmata should be locked up and removed from society.

Off-course he was a fake...lol for goodness sake, why do we have so many idiotic people on this planet?

16 - the executioners used charcoal. According to Messrs Knight and Lomas, JdM was tortured on a swing door and somehow this led to his image in a cloth becoming the Turin shroud'
When Louis XIV was guillotened some punter in the crowd shouted out "Jacque du Molay thou art avenged !" or whatever it was in French.

This was my original post @ #9. Should it have been deleted?

#3. INRH ... in Catholic theology, papal infallibility is the dogma that, by action of the Holy Spirit, the Pope is preserved from even the possibility of error when he solemnly declares or promulgates to the Church a dogmatic teaching on faith or morals as being contained in divine revelation, or at least being intimately connected to divine revelation. For all such infallible teachings, the Holy Spirit also works through the body of the Church to ensure that the teaching will be received by all Catholics.
This doctrine was defined dogmatically in the First Vatican Council of 1870.
According to Catholic theology, there are several concepts important to the understanding of infallible, divine revelation: Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the Sacred Magisterium. The infallible teachings of the pope are part of the Sacred Magisterium, which also consists of ecumenical councils and the "ordinary and universal magisterium". In Catholic theology, papal
infallibility is one of the channels of the infallibility of the Church. The infallible teachings of the pope must be based on, or at least not contradict, Sacred Tradition or Sacred Scripture. Papal infallibility does not signify that the pope is impeccable, i.e., that he is specially exempt from liability to sin.
According to "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Catholicism": "In reality, the pope seldom uses his power of infallibility......rather than being some mystical power of the pope, infallibility means the church allows the office of the pope to be the ruling agent in deciding what will be accepted as formal beliefs in the church."
Since the 1870 solemn declaration of Papal Infallibility by Vatican I, this power has been used only once: in 1950 when Pius XII defined the Assumption of Mary as being an article of faith for Roman Catholics.

C'mon people ... I though you

Blast it, #14, you beat me to it!!

#27, BW: Nothing at all. Good post.

#27 BW. Not a thing wrong with that post. The Hootsmon (Pravda Branch) censors obviously got their wires crossed. It was, in fact, educational for anyone that doesn't know too much about how the Rock Cakes work.

Then again, maybe they don't believe there is a "Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Catholicism", and think you're making it all up. I wonder if they also have a book called "Zen and Catholicism"? The one on motorcyles was a best seller.

A more digested #27 -- Infallibility only means the Pope is never wrong when he makes a decree about the Church. Like Diddy is infallible about Bad Boy Records. If he wanted to just sell waffles then waffles it is.

Regardless, it can be said of Pio that he OWNED the stigmata bit. Nothing worse than a half-ass stigmatic.

27 re 9

BW

Cave quid dicis, quando, et cui :-)

#31. Naah, Conan TL ... I've always been a bit of a chatterer. My mother used to say I was bigger than anyone where I grew up! And it's true ... I'll talk to anyone. :)

*I'm also twit! I left out the word "gossip" between 'bigger' and 'than'!!! :)

See how I owned up?? I'm too honest for my own good! :)))

"The Complete Idiot's Guide to " ... are reference books that provide a very basic understanding of seemingly difficult topics. This is accomplished by using very basic words and terminology to explain different facets of a topic. Definitions of words, profiles of people and a synopsis of events for context are also provided when necessary. They are very similar to the ... "For Dummies" books.

This series of books are published by Alpha, a member of Penguin Group USA Inc.

Prior to padre pio dying, his stigmata cleared up completely without any sign of a scar. This was documented by a physician that was not religious. There is plenty of evil in the world that will try to disprove holiness, don't let your ignorance make you one of these people.

26 - I meant Louis XVI, but I'm sure you all knew that.