One
evening Padre Pio was in a room, on the ground floor of the convent,
turned guesthouse. He was alone and had just laid down on the cot when,
suddenly, a man appeared to him wound in a black mantle. Padre Pio was
amazed and arose to ask the man who he was and what he wanted. The
stranger answered that he was a soul in Purgatory. “I am Pietro Di
Mauro” he said “I died in a fire, on September 18,
1908, in this convent. In fact this convent, after the expropriation of
the ecclesiastical goods, had been turned into a hospice for elderly. I
died in the flames, while I was sleeping on my straw mattress, right
in this room. I have come from Purgatory: God has granted me to come
here and ask you to say Mass for me tomorrow morning. Thanks to one Mass
I will be able to enter into Paradise”. Father Pio told the man that he
would say Mass for him..., “but…“padre Pio said: “I, wanted to
accompany him to the door of the convent. I surely realised I had
talked to a dead person, in fact when we went out in the church square,
the man that was at my side, suddenly disappeared”. I have to admit that
I re-entered in the convent rather frightened. Padre Paolino of
Casacalenda, Superior of the convent, noticed my nervousness, after
explaining to him what happened, I asked “permission to celebrate Holy
Mass for the deceased soul,” A few days later, Father Paolino, wanting
to verify the information, went to the office of the registry of the
commune of St. Giovanni Rotondo. He required and got the permission to
consult the register of the deceased in the year 1908. The story of
Father Pio Father was true. In the register of deaths of the month of
September, Father Paolino found the name, last name and cause of death:
“On September 18, 1908 in the fire of the hospice, Pietro Di Mauro
died.”
