Casa Sollievo della Sofferenza

Padre Pio called it "my creature". Casa Sollievo della Sofferenza, opened on 5 May 1956, was founded to give the sick of the Gargano first-rate care, and is today one of Italy's leading research hospitals.

He named it himself, and the exact day is known. On 14 January 1940, a few days after the first building committee was formed, Mario Sanvico asked him what the work should be called. Padre Pio answered at once: "Sollievo della Sofferenza" — relief of suffering.

Around that name gathered people who left everything to come here. Guglielmo Sanguinetti arrived saying he was only driving his wife, and in 1946 left the Mugello for the Gargano: he died two years before the hospital opened. Count John Telfner, who had met the friar in 1918, moved to San Giovanni Rotondo and was its sole administrator until Padre Pio's death — "how can you love the Father and not love his Work?". Carlo Kisvarday, a pharmacist from Zara, was told "build yourself a little house here", and spent the rest of his life recording every donation one by one.

The money came from far away. Barbara Ward, an English journalist, asked Padre Pio to pray for her fiancé: that fiancé, commander Jackson, was an UNRRA adviser and obtained 400 million lire of post-war funds from the United States Congress. 250 million arrived, in instalments.

But the work had begun before that, with nothing. Don Peppino Orlando had traced out a poor little road with the few coins in hand, and when Barbara Ward asked what those men were doing he answered "a great Hospital". "And who pays?". "Whoever passes by pays". War veterans and local farmers cut into the mountainside, led by Angelo Lupi.

On opening day Padre Pio began like this: "Gentlemen and brothers in Christ, Casa Sollievo della Sofferenza is complete. […] This is the creature that Providence, helped by you, has created; I present it to you".

For the pilgrim it is a stop that matters: seeing the concrete work born of the saint's charity helps you understand his story.

The quoted words are taken from the testimonies collected in the commemorative calendar of Casa Sollievo della Sofferenza.