When Father Vincenzo Cuomo, a priest from the Archdiocese of Naples, was a young man, he once traveled to San Giovanni Rotondo with a question for Padre Pio: He wanted to know if the holy Capuchin friar thought Don Dolindo should be his spiritual director.
“You from Naples, what are you doing here with me?” Padre Pio said, even before Father Cuomo could ask his question. “You have that great saint, Father Dolindo!”
And so, Father Cuomo became one of Don Dolindo’s spiritual sons. For the remainder of his life, Father Cuomo remained deeply devoted to both of these saintly priests, whose lives had so much in common that they seemed mysteriously linked.
Father Cuomo became an exorcist in Naples and, after Padre Pio and Don Dolindo had died, he often invoked their intercession during the rites of liberation.
One day, Father Cuomo went to San Giuseppe dei Vecchi, where Don Dolindo is buried, to offer Mass. It was November 19, the anniversary of Dolindo’s death, and Father Cuomo was celebrating Mass for the repose of his soul.
During the homily, a possessed girl began to scream. She began to lift the benches, trying to throw them in the air. Father Cuomo prayed but soon became discouraged with the evil he was facing.
Then he turned to Padre Pio. Specifically, he asked the saint from Pietrelcina to stop the girl’s arm.
Exactly at that moment, her right arm fell limply to her side.
She continued, however, to lift benches and other objects with her left arm. So Father Cuomo invoked the help of Don Dolindo: “Stop her other arm!”
And immediately, her left arm became calm.
With that, Father Cuomo was able to continue the exorcism rite until the girl was completely liberated.
When she had recovered, the girl told Father Cuomo that she had seen a friar who had intervened powerfully, and that she had recognized him as Padre Pio.
Then she said she saw a second friar, “with a black tunic, tiny, tiny, who was giving a hard time,” but she didn’t recognize him.
“Who was this, and where did he come from?” she asked Father Cuomo.
The exorcist understood that the girl’s words attested to the dual intercession of both Padre Pio and Don Dolindo.
(Regarding the words “tiny, tiny”: Not only was Dolindo was small in stature, but in his humility he often used words like “small” and “little” to refer to himself. For example, he called himself “Mary’s little old man.” In 1918, he wrote in his autobiography, “My God, my God! My spirit is anchored in You. It loses itself in You. I see myself, infinitesimally small, lost in the immense darkness of the star-studded sky.”)
After I read this story in the book Jesus, You Take Care of It!, I went and got a picture of Padre Pio from the bookshelf where I had been displaying it, and brought it over to the dresser where I keep an icon of Don Dolindo. I placed the two pictures side by side to remind me of their holy friendship and the power of their combined intercession.
It is not unusual for God to appoint special friends to work together to bring grace and heavenly assistance to souls. In Mark 6, Jesus sends his Apostles out two by two, and in pairs they “cast out many demons” and heal the sick. In Acts 3, it is Peter and John together who bring the miracle that makes the crippled man walk.
“Look at us,” Peter says to the man before he prays over him—not just “Look at me,” but “Look at us.” His words emphasize that it is the two disciples together who are interceding for his healing.
Back in Genesis, when Moses has to keep holding his hands up so that the Israelites can win the battle against the Amalekites (every time he puts his hands down, the Amalekites start winning; every time he puts them up, the Israelites start winning), Moses’s hands start getting tired. He needs reinforcements.
So, “Aaron and Hur held his hands up—one on one side, one on the other—so that his hands remained steady till sunset.” (Gen 17:12)
One on one side, one on the other, giving Moses’s arms a chance to rest.
Just like Padre Pio and Don Dolindo—one on one side, one on the other—giving the possessed girl’s arms a chance to rest.
The salve of holy friendship is a balm as old as time and as lasting as eternity. Its impact is imprinted in the history of salvation. I am convinced that these two beloved saints, Padre Pio and Don Dolindo, stand ready to intercede for us, too; and that if only we ask, they will come to our right and our left with the heavenly assistance that will help us find rest.
With gratitude to Elie Dib for his translation of Grazia Ruotolo and Luciano Regolo’s book, Jesus, You Take Care of It. This book also tells us that Father Cuomo died in the odor of sanctity in 2009, at the age of 86. May his soul, and all the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace.
Special thanks, too, to Maria Palma Smith for the use of her English translation of the book Amore, Dolindo, Dolore (Casa Mariana Editrice “Apostolato Stampa”, 2001). Publication of the English translation is forthcoming from Academy of the Immaculate Publishing.