“One is nice because [it shows everybody] hey, Padre Pio is smiling. Yes, he was smiling because he was a man. So we always think that Padre Pio was a serious man. We know that faith is also about laughing … sometimes,” Lamonarca said.
The professional opera singer grew up in Italy aware of the giant figure that Padre Pio was in the Catholic Church but didn’t have a particular devotion to the saint until he and his wife faced the great suffering of having a stillborn baby and receiving the news that they would probably not be able to have more children.
It was then that the couple turned to St. Pio’s intercession and, in the process, began to learn more about his life.
Lamonarca said he learned about St. Pio’s “simplicity and humility.”
“He was the grandfather I never had,” he told Flynn.
