The title is, He Was With One Foot in the Occult.
And to that Padre Pio exclaimed, "But that is heresy."
And it's the case of Frederick Abresch.
Good evening ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to this channel on Padre Pio.
And here we present a series of short stories on the life of our great saint.
He was a Capuchin friar, he was a mystic and an incredible miracle worker.
So do stay tuned to find out more about Padre Pio, and also to see what his intercession
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In the story, the case of Frederick Abresch is seen as quite a milestone in the list of
conversions by Padre Pio.
Now, Padre Pio actively sought people's conversion.
Little bit of background: Frederick Abresch was German by origin, and some years before
he had turned from Protestantism to Catholicism, but it was not entirely sincere.
And for him, in fact, it was more a matter of convenience than of conviction.
And so because of that, Abresch had no problem going in for studies of the Occult, which
of course robbed him of all of his peace.
And every now and then he would go to church, kind of compelled to do that by his wife,
unwillingly he went along.
His wife was a devout Catholic and also a follower of Padre Pio.
And then one day, urged by his wife, Abresch made the journey to San Giovanni Rotundo,
there to meet our holy priest who supposedly did all of these extraordinary things.
And their first meeting took place, so this was December 1928.
And Abresch was initially completely indifferent to this until he went to confession with Padre
Pio.
And then things were about to change for him in his life radically.
And Padre Pio told Abresch that in previous confessions that he had done, he'd actually
held back certain grave sins, so Padre Pio was aware of this.
And then Padre Pio asked him if he was really serious about doing this confession.
And Abresch tried now to justify himself by explaining that actually he didn't consider
confession...
"It was just a useful convention," he said.
But he did not accept it had a supernatural nature, so it kind of excluded our Lord from
confession.
Padre Pio's expression when he heard this, he became extremely stern and sad, and then
Padre Pio cried out, "But that what you say is heresy."
And he told Abresch that all of his communions had been sacrilegious because of this, and
that he had to start all over again from scratch, from zero.
And so much for his supposed conversion.
Abresch would have to prepare himself by going back to his very last good confession, whenever
that may have been.
And then Padre Pio went off to hear others' confessions.
Abresch, when he heard this, he was totally devastated by these words of Padre Pio.
And it had such a profound effect on him that he couldn't even recall any of his past.
But imagine if that had been one's final judgment, something like this, something serious crops
out, and he was completely stumped.
And when the priest returned, he found the poor man was still in the state of utter bewilderment.
Padre Pio then went ahead and took the initiative, and by a series of careful questioning, he
proceeded to parade Abresch's entire life before him.
It was like some sort of a spiritual projector was being cast onto his life.
Abresch was witnessing his own life, and it did not look so good.
So Padre Pio now finished off by saying, "You have been singing a hymn to Satan while Jesus
in His divine love has been breaking His neck for you."
And after this crystal clear reading of Abresch's soul, he now started to feel a deep sense
of repentance.
And when he left the confessional, he was pardoned, and a sense of unspeakable joy and
rejuvenation filled Abresch.
And so that is the difference that one sincere confession can make.
But things did not stop there, another miracle or two was to follow.
And Frederick Abresch's wife had been the first person to encourage her husband to go
and to meet with Padre Pio.
And now it was unfortunately her turn, and she found herself in this very tricky, very
difficult, painful situation because doctors were advising her that she needed a particular
operation.
But the side effects of that operation would be that it would prevent her having children
in the future.
Mrs. Abresch was not at all happy about this because she ardently desired to be a mother.
And so Frederick went and asked Padre Pio's advice on this.
Padre Pio thought for a moment, and he prayed a little bit.
And then the priest advised, "No.
No operation."
From that moment on, his wife began to feel completely cured, so that was the first miracle.
And then two years later, Padre Pio predicted to Abresch and his wife that they would have
a son who would one day become a priest.
And that prediction was also fulfilled exactly to the letter.
And so this was considered one of the significant milestone conversions that Padre Pio worked.
Next time on this channel, we're going to look at how tough was our saint?
So would you be able to resist having an operation without the anesthesia?
Well, let's find out if Padre Pio could.
And for what reason would he do that?
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