Saint Padre Pio Icon Print

Saint Padre Pio ready to frame print.  One of my sweet and wonderful friends, who has a remarkable devotion to Padre Pio, asked if I could make her a small icon of Padre Pio for her prayer space. Shortly thereafter I mentioned to a dear elderly friend what I was painting, and he said I have something you might like to see. Out of a very old envelope he pulled a yellowed handkerchief with what looked to be blood stains. He said his uncle was an altar boy and served mass with Padre Pio, and after mass ended one day, Padre Pio had wiped his hands onto the cloth. My friend Francis held on to that cloth, and now was allowing me to take the cloth home while I worked on Padre Pio. When the icon was completed, I laid the blood stained cloth onto the icon, which made the icon a 3rd class relic. Padre Pio was born Francesco Forgione to a poor farming family in central Italy in 1887. From a young age he was eager to pursue a religious life. At fifteen he entered the novitiate with the Capuchin fr