5. Jesus Crucified for Saint Jerome Emiliani
The cross of Jesus is at the center of the spiritual experience of Saint Jerome Miani and Saint Pio of Pietrelcina. His entire spiritual journey begins (he wept, placed at the feet of the Crucifix) and ends with the Cross of the Lord (follow the way of the Crucified One). Jerome is a convert – he had committed sins during his military service in the Republic of Venice and his concern was to meet a merciful God, who would not judge him, but save him with His forgiveness: he found Him in Jesus Crucified, whom he contemplated face to face, to whom he continually repeated “Sweetest Jesus, be not my judge, but my savior!”. Jesus crucified gave him the certainty of God’s goodness and mercy. He proposed to the Servants of the Poor to be frequent in prayer before the Crucifix, that He might grant them the grace to do penance in this life, a sign of earthly mercy and a pledge of eternal mercy. In expounding and teaching catechism to his children, Jerome begins with three lessons on the cross of Jesus. Jesus crucified is our ensign, under which we must militate, armed with living faith, certain hope and ardent charity. Jesus crucified is, so to speak, the that was infused in us at baptism as a renunciation of the devil, holiness of the soul, promise of paradise, it is a reality that we must always have before our eyes. Jesus crucified is finally the mold of our life, the model into which we are, so to speak, fused, a shield against the evil one, assimilation to Christ: we will bear, live and die on the cross with Christ, we will resurrect and be glorious with Him. It is significant that Saint Jerome Emiliani, in the days of his last illness, drew a red cross on the wall of the small room where he was about to die, so that he could contemplate it until the last moments of his existence. The discovery of the crucified and merciful Jesus aroused in Saint Jerome an ardent thirst for reform: the goal is the holiness of the Church, to be always actualized. He, with his companions and his children, sought to form evangelical communities within hospitals and his works. In the eyes of his friends he appeared as the Christian reformed according to the holy Gospel.
6. Jesus Crucified for Padre Pio
Padre Pio, to renew the holiness of the Church, lived first in his heart and then in his flesh, with the stigmata, the passion of Jesus. He renewed after eight centuries the mystical prodigy of Saint Francis, champion of the Church’s holiness, a champion “all seraphic in ardor” “because he went towards his beloved, the bride of Him who with loud cries espoused her with blessed blood, secure in herself and more faithful to him … in the rough rock between Tiber and Arno from Christ he received the final seal that his limbs bore for two years.” The stigmata are like the extreme definitive seal of Christ’s love and of assimilation to His passion, borne by Padre Pio not only for two years like Saint Francis, but for fifty years of his life. Padre Pio had made the apostle Paul’s saying his own: “I want to concern myself with nothing but Jesus and Jesus Crucified.” Even amidst so many mystical gifts, Padre Pio’s life was a continuous martyrdom. “I love the cross, the cross alone, because I always see it on Jesus’ shoulders. Now Jesus sees very well that my whole life, my whole heart is devoted to Him and to His pains… I suffer, I suffer greatly… Suffering with Jesus is dear to me; in contemplating the cross on Jesus’ shoulders, I feel more strengthened and exult with holy joy.” He will guide souls to this complex spirituality of the cross, based on the word of God, on the great spiritual masters, particularly on Saint John of the Cross, and on his own spiritual experience.
The cross is the center, the inspiring principle of all Padre Pio’s theology, of his spiritual direction. Around it he revolves all the virtues, both the theological ones of faith, hope, and charity, and the intellectual and behavioral ones, and the whole life of prayer up to the joyful acceptance of suffering in union with Jesus crucified, victim of our sins. How suffering and joy can coexist in the heart of Padre Pio and so many saints is almost a mystery of Christian life, comprehensible only in faith. Some expressions of Dante still come to mind, who sees the “venerable sign” of the cross flashing in paradise amidst the joy and jubilation of the militant spirits. And then he adds:
“Here my memory overcomes my ingenuity, That cross so flashed forth Christ, That I know not how to find a worthy example; But he who takes his cross and follows Christ Will still excuse me for what I omit, Seeing Christ flash forth in that splendor.”
He who takes his cross and follows Christ will always see the Crucified and Risen Christ flashing on it, a source of joy for militant Christians and for the blessed in heaven. Attracted by Christ Crucified, Padre Pio walked the entire path of prayer, even to the highest peaks. If spiritual masters divide prayer into various stages – vocal prayer, mental prayer, affective prayer, prayer of simplicity, infused recollection, prayer of quiet, prayer of transformation, falling in love with Jesus, mystical marriage with Him until burning with the divine Spouse like red-hot iron in fire – certainly Padre Pio reached the supreme point of prayer: the heart of Jesus crucified was his nuptial chamber and to it he wanted to guide all the souls he spiritually directed and those who came to visit him, to contemplate in his flesh the signs of Jesus’ passion.
We can say with certainty that all aspects of Padre Pio’s life—his faith, his hope, his charity, that is, the theological virtues infused at baptism, as well as his intelligence and thought, his will, his feelings of sorrow, love, and joy, his exterior and interior senses, his unconscious, his physical body marked by the stigmata, his very environment of life—were, so to speak, marked by the “last seal,” that is, by full participation in the passion and resurrection of Jesus.
7. The Eucharist for Saint Jerome
Connected to the love for the cross of Jesus, for the way of the Crucified One, there is the love for the Eucharist. Saint Jerome firmly believes that the Eucharist, sacrifice of Jesus and our sacrifice, divine presence of the risen Jesus among us, is the foundation of the Christian life of every single believer and of every religious community. His first biographer states that when Jerome decided to imitate his dear master Jesus with all his strength, he began to frequent churches, preachings, Masses, to read the Bible and other spiritual books, to associate with friends who could help him with counsel and example.
An eyewitness tells us that when Jerome arrived in Brescia (he was walking towards Bergamo for a mission of charity) on May 9, 1532, the feast of the Ascension, the confreres of Divine Love, who had confessed, accompanied Jerome to the Church of San Giovanni Battista for the celebration of Holy Mass. This city chronicler, Pandolfo Nassino, who was present and who in those years reported notable events happening in Brescia, states that Jerome attended Holy Mass with such humility and devotion that “I don’t know how much more is possible.” After the priest left, turning to the confreres of Divine Love, Jerome thanked God because on the feast of the Ascension He had entered their homes and ascended to heaven and added that the confreres of Divine Love had done wrong, immediately after communion, while their minds were elevated to heaven, to rummage in their purses to give the offering publicly. The offering for the priest should have been prepared beforehand and then among the confreres secretly at another time, other money should be collected for the poor, without risk of pride and vainglory.
When he arrived in Somasca, Jerome asked Messer priest Lazzarino (a priest from Calolzio) for collaboration and spiritual assistance for his orphans. He let him know by letter (July 5, 1535) that he should warmly invite the boys to confession and communion according to the usual good devotion. And not let the fire of the Spirit cool down, so that everything does not go to ruin. Then he addressed by letter a group of seven men who helped him in his work and in the care of the orphans: to the seven that they should remember to confirm themselves in the charity of God and neighbor and in confessions and communions at the proper times.
Jerome’s primary concern as organizer of the Company of the Servants of the Poor was to have a chapel in his houses to celebrate and preserve the Eucharist. He finally succeeded in obtaining this permission with a document from Bishop Aleandro, papal nuncio in Venice, on September 1, 1535. It states: “Choose a priest who will confess you and administer the Eucharist to you whenever you wish.” While awaiting this permission, Jerome dreamed of the promised land and the “place of peace,” perhaps the possibility that in all the works there would be a chapel for confessions and the celebration and preservation of the Eucharist.
Another Eucharistic practice, just beginning, which Jerome knew in Milan, where the Oratory of Divine Wisdom was based, and which aimed to reform the Church by spreading the cult of the Eucharist, was that of the Forty Hours, immediately introduced into the Company. In the processes for the beatification of Saint Jerome, it is insisted that Father Jerome’s spiritual exercises were many and that the most notable were these: daily Holy Mass heard with particular acts of internal and external devotion; almost continuous prayer, because while walking, standing, sitting, working, as long as the work did not require the use and office of the hand, he was always seen with the rosary in hand; very frequent fasting and discipline of the body.
Let us not forget what Jerome says to Father Lazzarino: without participation in the Eucharist, the fire of the Spirit cools down and everything goes to ruin.
8. The Eucharist for Padre Pio
Without a doubt, the most important moment of Padre Pio’s day was the celebration of the Eucharist, the Holy Mass, to which he felt drawn by a mysterious force until he was transfigured, almost a synthesis of all the gifts of grace that Jesus had granted him, and also a synthesis of his mission because at the altar he brought all his children and the sick who recommended themselves to him. It is the source of his spirituality, it is at the origin of the prayer groups, to which active participation in Holy Mass is proposed as a first thing. For Padre Pio, all the hours preceding the divine sacrifice, all his steps towards the sacristy, the dressing of the vestments, the approach to the altar, the various moments of the celebration such as consecration, communion, thanksgiving took place in a kind of atmosphere and mystical rapture, as if he were burning in a divine fire, in a kind of mystical marriage, which also involved the very strong beats of his heart, his complexion, the bleeding of the stigmata, moments of ecstasy, and tears of desire and love for Jesus. The testimonies are numerous.
“I sometimes ask myself if there are souls who do not feel their chest burn with divine fire, especially when they are before Jesus in the sacrament. To me it seems impossible, especially if it concerns a priest, a religious.” “I have such hunger and thirst before receiving him, that I almost die of anguish…”
“The heart of Jesus and mine, allow me the expression, fused. They were no longer two hearts beating, but one. My heart had disappeared, like a drop lost in a sea…” Many priests and faithful were astonished and stated that they had never seen a priest celebrate Holy Mass with such fervor and with such participation in the Paschal mystery of Jesus. The same was said for the layman Jerome Emiliani when he participated in the Eucharist, with devotion that I do not believe could be greater.
The Eucharist, Padre Pio repeated with some brief sentences to those who questioned him, is a fusion with Jesus, like two candles that unite their flame and become one without being distinguished anymore. “It is all an internal and external mercy. All an embrace. Pray to Jesus that He may make Himself felt sensibly.” The words of Saint Augustine come to mind: “And that I love you, Lord, I have no doubt; I am certain of it. With your word you touched my heart, and I began to love you. But what do I love when I love you? Not a bodily beauty nor a transient grace; not the splendor of a light so dear to these eyes of mine; not sweet melodies of varied songs; not a perfume of flowers, ointments and aromas; not manna nor honey; not inviting limbs for carnal embraces. When I love my God, I do not love these things. And yet, when I love Him, I love a certain light, a voice, a fragrance, a food and an embrace that are the light, the voice, the fragrance, the food, the embrace of the inner man that is in me, where a light shines on my soul that no flow of centuries can carry away, where a fragrance spreads that no gust of wind can disperse, where a taste is savored that no voracity can diminish, where a relationship is woven that no satiety can break. All this I love when I love my God.”
