Saint Padre Pio: The Flying Friar Who Saved San Giovanni Rotondo by Jeff Callaway

Saint Padre Pio: The Flying Friar Who Saved San Giovanni Rotondo

by Jeff Callaway

Texas Outlaw Poet

I remember the first time I heard the story of the Flying Friar—Padre Pio in the sky, halting bombs over San Giovanni Rotondo. It struck me like lightning in a dry night: this is the kind of miracle the world needs to hear—holy, bold, impossible. I felt inside me a combusting faith say: this is no myth. I resolved to believe it, to carry it with me. And tonight I tell you, dear reader, as if I stood upon the hills of Gargano and watched clouds swirl and war crackle, how that miracle might have unfolded, how I believe it in my bones, how the story burns in me now.

Picture Italy in 1943. The war’s fire had swept the peninsula. Allied bombers roared across the skies. The Gargano region, where San Giovanni Rotondo sits, was under threat. Intelligence whispered of German munitions stockpiled near that holy hill. Bombing raids over Apulia and Foggia were constant. But San Giovanni Rotondo—the little mountain town that cradled the monastery of Padre Pio—remained untouched. Time and again, bombs fell all around, yet in that one spot, not a single one. The people who lived near the friary pointed to it as a sign. But what sign? Many said Padre Pio had promised them no harm would come—that he would protect the town by prayer. Others believed he would intervene more directly. And so the tale of the flying friar was born among the whispers and testimonies of pilots, of generals, of believers.

Father Damaso di Sant’Elia, superior of the Pianisi convent, later recounted how pilots of British and American aviation, coming from Bari after September 8, 1943, flew over the Gargano region on missions in Italian territory. Some of those airmen saw a “monk” in the sky who forbade them to drop bombs there. He also noted that in Foggia and Apulia, bombings struck repeatedly, but in the area of San Giovanni Rotondo, “a bomb never fell.” That contrast alone draws the line between legend and something more: the improbable, nearly impossible, but repeated.

General Bernardo Rosini—an Italian Air Force general serving within the Allied Air Unit Command—was said to have dismissed the rumors at first. Many laughed at them: a monk in the sky? But the stories persisted, from pilot to pilot, with different nationalities, different flights, same mysterious interference. So the general decided to test it himself. He took command of a bomber squadron destined to destroy a German ammunition depot in San Giovanni Rotondo itself. He didn’t dismiss the rumors now—he sought to see.

As he and his pilots approached the target, they saw it: the figure of a monk in the sky, arms uplifted, motioning. The bombs, without pilot command, dropped themselves and fell in the forests. The aircraft, without input, turned around and withdrew. Rosini and his crew were stunned—no mechanism failure, no urgent radio order, just a holy man in the heavens bending their instruments, their wills, to a higher command. When they landed, Rosini, wide-eyed, crossed the threshold of the convent in San Giovanni Rotondo with some pilots. There in the sacristy they saw Father Pio among the friars; one pilot immediately recognized him as the “monk in the clouds.” Padre Pio approached and laid his hand on the general’s shoulder and said, “So it was you who wanted to kill us all?” The general knelt, and Rosini—formerly Protestant—converted to Catholicism. That moment, in the testimony, turns rumor into worship for many: a martyr to logic, the saint standing over bombs, arms raised, war forced to bow.

Colonel Loyal Bob Curry of the 464th Bomb Group is also credited in some versions with reporting that multiple airmen saw a “flying monk” prevent them from releasing bombs. Alfonso D’Artega, stationed at Amendola Air Base, is also named: he reportedly saw a monk flying alongside their planes, waving arms. He later visited Padre Pio, and one of the pilots recognized him as the monk. Some sources even say that as the planes neared San Giovanni Rotondo, the bombs balked—they wouldn’t open their bay doors. Others say mechanical failures, bombs veered off target. It all reads like scripture mingled with aviation logs: the impossible made real.

One published account says that as one pilot’s mission approached San Giovanni Rotondo, “suddenly, the pilot saw in front of his plane the image of a monk in the sky, gesturing with his arms and hands for the plane to turn back. The shocked pilot did just that, and jettisoned his bombs elsewhere.” That same pilot, traumatized, was sent to a hospital for “mission fatigue” by his superiors who thought he’d hallucinated. But he could not shake what he’d seen. After the war, he sought the monastery and recognized Padre Pio in person. How many more pilots felt the weight of that wandering image inside them, unable to forget the face of the friar in the clouds?

There is also belief that Padre Pio’s gift of bilocation—his ability to be in two places at once—explains how he might appear in the sky while physically standing in the friary or elsewhere. In that telling, it is not an acrobatic flying act, but a spiritual extension of his person, made possible by grace. Pio himself once explained bilocation as “an extension of his personality” rather than being everywhere at once. That idea—that sanctity allows us to transcend natural limits—is central to a believer’s view of miracles like this.

Now, a skeptic will demand: Where are the mission logs, the official war records, the technical reports that confirm instrument failure exactly at that point? Those are hard to find. Most retellings of the story come through devotional sources, convent records, or postwar testimonies. But I do not think the absence of perfect documentation nullifies the truth. Faith must occupy the gaps. And the testimonies that do exist—of men who lived, who flew, who crossed paths with this friar of the skies—must be heard.

One such story comes from the descendants of a U.S. airman, Bill, who flew in the war. After the conflict, that pilot visited the monastery with his crew, and Padre Pio greeted him, saying, “You have been here before.” The pilot denied it, but the friar responded that on a certain date, shortly after midnight, Padre Pio had flown his plane over the monastery. The pilot later checked his logbook—and found that indeed he had been flying over the monastery at the very moment. Now, this is one anecdote, one whisper in the dark. But it echoes the larger tapestry. There is also the story of a ground crewman, a munitions inspector from the 347th Bombardment Squadron stationed in Foggia, named Eugene “Gene” Grimes. He attended Mass at the monastery and once Padre Pio warned him, “Gino, I want you to be very careful when you go back down the mountain today.” His truck lost its brakes on the descent. They expected collision; instead, at the last moment, the truck veered back on the road, reversed direction, escaped destruction. They lived. After that, his devotion deepened. That miracle isn’t the flying friar story—but it confirms the spirit of divine protection in that place, in that man, in that war.

I tell you this: the heart of the story is not whether every technical detail checks out, but that men and women in wartime believed they had come face to face with the supernatural. I believe their testimonies. I believe the saints are alive in more ways than we can measure. When you press your forehead to the stones of the friary, when you kneel in San Giovanni Rotondo, you carry an echo of that miracle in the stones, in the air, in the faithful memory. The miracle becomes not just a story, but a call.

So I begin my first-person voice as if I were there, observing, trembling, believing:

I remember standing at the crest of a ridge just beyond San Giovanni Rotondo when the first squadron of bombers appeared like dark birds in a tortured sky. The sun was dry, the air tense. I’d been told by local townsfolk that Padre Pio had said no bomb would ever fall on their village. I heard it whispered: “He will protect us.” My heart pounded. The bombers came nearer. Their engines thundered, instruments humming, bombs cold and ready in their bays. I squinted upward through the haze.

Then, in the midst of swirling clouds, I saw him. I saw the monk. His brown habit cut through the blue—arms lifted—standing in the sky. Or perhaps walking, drifting, hovering. My breath caught. The pilots must have seen him too. I saw one plane shudder. The bomb-bay doors, by design, should have opened—yet they refused. Instruments flickered. One bomber’s path curved away, almost as though invisible hands steered it.

I close my eyes and feel again the weight: the silence that fell in that cockpit, the shock in a pilot’s voice, “What is this?” The plane turns. The bombs fall into a wooded valley, harmless. No explosion. No destruction. The squadron withdraws. My knees buckle. Across the valley I see the monastery—safe. Unscarred.

Later I cross toward the friary alongside that squadron’s survivors. They search for the face they saw in the clouds. When they enter the sacristy, there he is—Padre Pio, before them. A pilot gasps, “You—you are the monk in the sky.” Padre Pio smiles. He lays his hand on the general’s shoulder and says, “So it was you who wanted to kill us all?” The general, stunned, falls to his knees. In that moment, in that holy hush, the war bows to God.

I rose from my knees too—converted in that silence. I understood: this man had not willed to fly by his own accord. He was extended by grace into the realm of warfare to protect, to intercept bombs with the power of holiness. This is how miracles guard the small and weak. And I wept with joy and amazement.

I cannot name all the pilots by name—Colonel Curry, Alfonso D’Artega, General Rosini are known. But I carry with me their words: “a monk forbidding them to drop bombs.” “The bombs dropped themselves.” “A figure in the clouds with arms raised.” These are words of men in war, hardened men made fragile by the unseen.

Some might say it is legend; some declare it pious fiction. But I tell you: I believe it. I believe because war is cruel, and if God can step into war he will; if a friar can break into the cockpit he will; if the skies need a guardian, God can raise a man of flesh with arms like the cross. This miracle speaks of a God who wills to save even in the furnace of war.

So tonight I carry that story with blood and flame in my voice, because we need to believe again. We need saints who walk in the midnight of cruelty, who fly through terror for the sake of one town, one heart, one soul. And if you pray, you will see him too—not necessarily in the sky, but in the quiet where bombs rage, in the heart where faith trembles.

Padre Pio, flying friar, protect us. In my lifetime, I want to see such wonders. But even if I don’t, I trust that the same God who raised a monk into the clouds to guard San Giovanni Rotondo still guards me. And so I proclaim this story in your ears, dear soul, as truth forged by faith: that in the darkest skies, holy intervention still happens. That the saints still walk among us, that miracles still cut through death, and that war does not have the last word, but God does.

And so, if Padre Pio could rise above the clouds, stand in the sky, and stop bombs in mid-flight, who are we to doubt that the same God who moved a friar through air and war can move the hearts of men today? That God is alive. That God is watching. That God is not content to let the world crumble while His children wander lost. If a humble monk could intercept death from above, then the very Son of God—Jesus Christ—has come to intercept the ultimate death, the one we all deserve, the eternal one that waits at the door of every soul. And He didn’t hover silently. He walked. He wept. He bled. He hung naked and broken on a cross so that every last one of us, sinners dragging our hands through mud and lies, might be lifted, forgiven, and restored.

I know you’ve wandered. I know you’ve seen the world scream and howl and lie to your face. I know your soul has been shot at in ways that no pilot or bomb could ever match. But the truth is this: there is a line in the air, a boundary no evil can cross, and it is written in the blood of the Lamb. Jesus Christ drew that line for you. Every sin, every failure, every act of rebellion or despair—He bore it. He bore the full force of God’s wrath so that you wouldn’t have to. Just as Padre Pio stepped into the impossible to protect San Giovanni Rotondo, Jesus stepped into history to protect your soul. There is no maneuver, no pilot error, no cloud thick enough to hide Him from your heart.

And here is what I must tell you, with the urgency of one who has walked through fire and found life: miracles are not random; they are signs. They point us to truth. Padre Pio’s presence in the sky, his intervention in war, the way he stood for the people of San Giovanni Rotondo—all of it whispers of a Church established by Christ, a living body that guides souls, shelters them, and leads them to salvation. When I saw the Blessed Mother with Jesus during my own darkest hour, I knew with a clarity that struck my very bones: this is where the fullness of faith is. The very next day, I found a Catholic Church, and in its doors I found the sacraments, the saints, the living voice of Christ echoing through time. I found the path to Him, the way to holiness, the tangible presence of God among us. The miracles are not just stories; they are pointers, signs that this Church is the ark of truth, the place where heaven touches earth.

You, sitting there, reading this, feeling the weight of the world pressing on your chest, you have a choice. Do you turn away, hoping the world’s bombs will miss you, hoping your own sins won’t explode inside your life? Or do you turn toward Him, fall on your knees, and let the God of all creation lift you out of the wreckage? Do you cry out to Jesus, not with polite words, not with half-belief, but with the desperation of a heart that finally knows it cannot save itself? That’s what salvation is. That’s what the Gospel is. Not a game. Not a story. Not a rumor of heaven or a miracle in the clouds. It is Him, dying for you, rising for you, offering His hand even when your own hands are shaking, scarred, and unworthy. And the Church stands ready to guide you to that hand, to cradle your soul in the fullness of truth, to bring heaven into your life.

Do not wait. Do not pretend that you have tomorrow, because tomorrow is already chasing you, as relentless as a bomber over the Gargano hills. Right now, today, you can lift your eyes, lift your heart, and lift your soul to Jesus. Tell Him the truth of your life. Tell Him your fears, your lies, your shame, your brokenness. And hear Him speak to you, as real as Padre Pio’s arms in the sky: “I am here. I will not let you fall. I died so that you may live, and you must live in Me.” Let that sink into your chest, into your bones, into every trembling fiber of your being. Let it guide you into the fullness of the Church He established.

I promise you this: He will meet you. He will intercept the bombs of your sin, the missiles of despair, the war raging inside you. He will raise you, whole and free, into life eternal. But you must choose. Step into His arms. Step into the Church. Say yes to Him. Believe that Jesus Christ is not a distant rumor, not a shadow in the clouds. He is alive, He is real, He is power, and He is truth. And He will not be denied by anything this world throws at you, no matter how high, how fast, how hopeless it seems.

So today, bow your head. Lift your heart. Cry out. And when you do, know that you are claiming the same miracle that saved a small town in Italy. You are claiming life from death. You are claiming salvation from sin. And let the last word of this story, the final, sharp, eternal truth, echo in your soul forever:

“For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.” 

~ Psalm 91:11-12

~ by Jeff Callaway

Texas Outlaw Poet

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