Today our talk is called Nair, the Red Pasionaria of Emilia.
She went from being an atheistic social activist to being a devoted follower of Padre Pio.
As we'll see, she was very passionate about whatever she did.
This is the story about her conversion.
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.
Welcome to this channel on Padre Pio.
Here we have a series of short stories in which we investigate the life of our great
Saint Padre Pio, who was a Capuchin friar, a mystic, an incredible miracle worker.
Do stay tuned to find out more about Padre Pio and also to see what his intercession
could do for you.
Join us in the apostolate.
It would be tremendous if you help us by liking the video and sharing the video with your
friends and with your colleagues.
Just a word of thanks to our protected child of Padre Pio patrons.
You are the ones who make these videos possible for everyone.
Anyone wishing to help in this way, just see the video on the end screen.
Now, in the story today...
It is about this lady called Nair.
She was from Bologna in Italy.
Nair, as we said, was one of those people who, when she took up a cause, she'd give
herself completely to the cause.
For Nair, it was all or nothing.
There was no in-between.
Nair, of course, was not her real name.
It was an assumed... a nickname we could say.
She was, in fact, Italia Betti.
She had taken up, in her life, the cause of human justice, as she called it.
Perhaps today, she would be called a social justice warrior.
But she firmly believed that this battle for justice could only be won by communism.
This was her ideology, and it was an atheistic solution.
Nair was born into a very poor family, together with 12 siblings.
Only after tremendous effort and sacrifices was she able to complete her studies.
She attained a doctorate.
After that, she became a teacher, teaching mathematics and physics at the Galvani High
School in Bologna.
As a member of the Communist Party, which she was, she was fervent and militant.
She would take her communist militancy even to the point that we could describe it as
religious zeal.
But after many years of this, slowly, slowly, it began to wear her down.
For me, our Lord's words come to mind: that man does not live on bread alone.
There's something else missing.
This continual pursuing her communist activism she became very wary of, both physically and
morally.
Over time, little by little, Nair began to realize that communism does not, in fact,
have the solutions, not for her cause of justice that she'd been given her life to.
During this period, Betti, Nair's real name... She had a dream about Padre Pio.
In this dream, she stood outside a house that brought terror to everyone who entered the
house.
The choice was given to her, either to go into the house of terror or to remain outside
in peace.
Now, she was quite impressed by this dream.
She began to wonder, "What could it mean?"
She couldn't come to a conclusion.
She decided she had better go to meet the friar, who was in the dream, Padre Pio.
She needed to go to San Giovanni Rotondo.
Betti made the trip to San Giovanni Rotondo with her mother and her sister.
This was now December of 1949.
Once they were there, they attended Padre Pio's mass.
Somehow, just attending one mass of Padre Pio...
It opened up the spiritual dimension to her.
Nair now felt compelled to reflect on this new spiritual dimension.
She remained in the church after this for at least two hours just reflecting on this.
Then, after that, she went to confession with Padre Pio.
In the confession, she came to realize and to understand that the struggle for true justice
can only be realized within the context of a Christian view of life.
We'll see her explaining this shortly.
Nair converted.
Then, from that point on, she expanded all of her energies on the spiritual path that
was indicated by Padre Pio.
Then, eventually, Nair or Betti could not stand leaving San Giovanni.
She did not want to be away from the spiritual ambiance, away from the saint.
She made this choice that whatever she had in Bologna, she was going to leave behind.
She moved into a small house built near the man who had led her to conversion because
being near Padre Pio... a tremendous privilege.
Betti died after that.
That was October 1950.
In her last will and testament, she writes this: "My return to the church," she says,
"after having rejected it for 20 years/having rejected the church for 20 years was done
knowingly and not simply through fear of losing my life.
It was the result of a conscious crying out.
Crying out for peace!
It did not take long for me to come to the profound understanding that life was not what
I had been living up until that time.
I understood, in an indisputable way, that it is absurd for us to think of humans as
only little organized molecules in the universe, or we, as rulers or gods, in a sense, through
all of science.
Man," she says, "is a divine creation, and so we must feel part of it all.
We are not an end in ourselves.
And we must recognize that we are only a little particle of energy, which constantly needs
a guide to help him go on."
In this story, we've seen such a profound turnaround in Nair's life.
This was just after one dream with Padre Pio, one mass with Padre Pio, and going to confession
only once.
This indicates, to us, the profound spiritual impression that Padre Pio made on everyone.
Next time, we're going to be having a look at a story that is called that is quite enough.
It was about an atheist, a communist as well, who was feverishly against the church and
against anything Catholic.
Was Padre Pio able to make any difference here in this person's life?
Please do join us for that talk.
Dear friends of Following Padre Pio, wouldn't you like to be, as scripture says, "Those
who instruct many to justice shall be as the stars for eternity."
Apparently, that's from the Book of Daniel.
With that intention in mind, we offer you a special program.
It's called the Protected Child of Padre Pio Program.
Through this, if you join this program, you'll be helping our team at Following Padre Pio
to reach out to many people, hopefully, to inspire them so that they do not give up hope,
that they do not lose faith in God in these very trying times.
If you and I can give them this hope, then our Lord Jesus Christ's death would not have
been in vain for them.
That's our aim.
We also have regular masses celebrated for all of those who join the Protected Child
of Padre Pio Program.
Of course, there are other benefits too.
To find out more, just click the video on the end screen, or you can go to the link
in the video description below.