Ten unpublished snapshots from the Father’s photographer: Memoirs of a Saint

Tiziana Campisi – Vatican City

“Do as many as you want but without that hassle”: Padre Pio really did not tolerate the flash of cameras. That flash of light generated by the combustion of magnesium powder bothered him, but that boy who had haunted the convent of San Giovanni Rotondo since he was a child and who had immortalized him to earn a few lire knew him well, so he gave him permission to take all the snapshots you want, but without flash. Elia Stelluto, born in 1935, took thousands of photos of the Franciscan monk, in everyday life, during various celebrations, in the most intimate moments, all without flash. However, they all have a unique light. “I still can’t understand the mystery of these photos,” says “the photographer of Padre Pio”, who was the “boy photographer” of the friar of Pietrelcina. Ten of his photographs, some unpublished, are now freely available to believers and devotees of the saint on a specific website. (therealsaintpio.org).

The images were presented yesterday at a press conference at the Vatican Film Archive, under the sponsorship of the Dicastery for Communication and the Dicastery for Education and Culture, by Stelluto himself together with the founder of the San Pio Foundation, Luciano Lamonarca, who wanted to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the beatification of Padre Pio and the 10th anniversary of the Foundation with the initiative “Photographs of Saint Pio – Memories of a Saint”.

A saint of the people

“Padre Pio is a still relevant figure who continues to attract so many people,” stressed Andrea Tornielli, editorial director of the Dicastery for Communication, who spoke at the press conference: “A saint of the people because he came from the people, a saint capable of to communicate even though theirs was a demanding Catholicism. And the photographs chosen by Stelluto and Lamonarca thus show the saint of Pietrelcina, a simple friar, captured among his brothers in community life or while celebrating mass or even in the act of blessing a rosary. The snapshots also help to reconstruct his life, said Monsignor Felice Accrocca, archbishop of Benevento – diocese in which Padre Pio lived the first years of his life -, adding how important it is to contextualize the environment in which the religious was born and raised. and outline everything that marked his personality, forged by local customs and traditions.

Elia Stelluto’s cameras

The photographer’s memories of Padre Pio

“It was my wish to donate photos to the entire Catholic world and to the spiritual children of Padre Pio,” says Stelluto, who tells some anecdotes of the years spent at the side of the holy friar, “a sweet”, affectionate person, whose face lit up with a smile. Elías was also his altar boy and remembers that, after mass, the boys went to kiss the stained hands of Padre Pio, “a spring that never dries up” and about which one never tires of talking. Remembering to pray, going to mass on Sundays and reciting the Rosary: ​​these are the lessons received that Stelluto keeps in his heart. “His weapon was the Rosary,” he explains to Vatican News, recalling that to those who asked him for miracles, the religious recommended prayer above all.

The person who today manages Elia Stelluto’s immense photographic archive, made up of some three thousand snapshots and several films, is his grandson, Rubén Lobos. The films have been digitized, he tells us, and adds that there are many still unpublished photos of Padre Pio through which it is possible to learn about his daily life.

The initiatives of the San Pío Foundation

The face of the Saint of Pietrelcina who wants to be made known is a lay face, the face of a humble person, says Lamonarca, whose idea, by making some of Stelluto’s photos available, is to make Padre Pio better known to who simply identify him as the stigmatized saint. To this end, the San Pio Foundation has made various resources available, and more recently also “La canzone di Padre Pio”, composed by the Foggia musician Rico Garofalo together with his friend and lyricist Gino Scauzillo, and re-listened to by Lamonarca to make it available. freely available to the public.

The Foundation has also selected 365 letters, one for each day of the year, which have been translated into five languages, written by Saint Pio to his spiritual directors and spiritual children, to serve as a guide to those seeking a source of inspiration. Finally, a documentary is being prepared. “We want to give a message of hope,” concludes Lamonarca, “we must be more in communion with ourselves and with others, and I believe and hope that Padre Pio will incite people to be more peaceful.”