Professor Nicola Pende and Maria Valtorta

From Wiki Maria Valtorta
Nicola Pende in the 1930s.

Professor Nicola Pende, born in Noicattaro (Bari), April 21, 1880, and died in Rome, June 8, 1970, was a world-renowned Italian doctor, specialist in endocrinology[1] and constitutional pathologies[2]. He was an expert for the scientific examination of miraculous healings with the Congregation of Rites (for the cause of saints). He directed the Umberto I Hospital[3], taught at the University of Rome[4]. Awarded the War Cross for the First World War, he was also a senator from December 20, 1933, to August 5, 1943, during the Fascist period[5].

As a political figure of this period, he was criticized for his stance in favor of eugenics[6]. In 1945 he was banned from teaching, but the following year this ban was lifted by the Court of Appeal of Rome. In 1948, the Supreme Court of Cassation definitively restored him in his functions, taking into account notably his attitude during the roundup of the Rome ghetto (October 16, 1943) where 23 Jews found refuge in his polyclinic.

His Actions in Favor of Maria Valtorta[edit | edit source]

He had the opportunity to examine Maria Valtorta and visited her several times. A reader of the work, he was struck by the medical precision it contained and intervened several times to facilitate its publication. However, he could not accept the supernatural origin of the Work, for which he unsuccessfully sought a scientific explanation.

Attestation of January 23, 1952[edit | edit source]

"I had the chance, nearly three years ago (1949), to read some volumes of Maria Valtorta’s manuscript on the Life of Jesus. I will also say that Father Berti tasked me with subjecting Miss Valtorta to a thorough medical examination. With the help of Professor Duranti, a radiologist in Pisa, I performed radiographic observation of her spinal column: indeed, she had been presenting a paraplegia[7] that confined her to bed for years. Aside from the diagnosis of this condition, which is covered by professional secrecy, I give here my impression and opinion on the contents of these writings.

To my eyes, they constitute a true masterpiece in terms of style, purity of language, and form, which is unexpected in a woman with a rather modest literary education[8].

I devote my modest efforts to studying the human characteristics of Jesus as they appear in the gospels and as a Christian biologist might see them; thus, I must affirm what I found in Maria Valtorta’s writings, namely that this humanity of Jesus not only corresponds in its main traits to that reported by the four evangelists but is carved and illuminated more deeply and with greater richness of detail, allowing one to say that Maria Valtorta’s account fills the gaps in the human life of the Redeemer. This is particularly true of the period of Jesus’ adolescence and youth in the house of Joseph the carpenter[9], and of Jesus’ affectionate relations with His Mother during this long period, finally the separation of the Son and His Mother when He begins His Mission among men[10]. But what provoked my greatest admiration and all my amazement as a physician is the skill with which Maria Valtorta describes, like an expert, a phenomenology that few experienced doctors could expose: the scene of Jesus’ agony on the cross[11].

The spasmodic pain, the most atrocious suffered by the Redeemer because of the wounds on the head, hands, and feet bearing the body weight in the wounds, causes, in Maria Valtorta’s account, tonic contractions of the whole body, tetanic stiffness of the trunk and limbs that neither weaken the consciousness nor the will of the dying man, even though they express the greatest physical suffering produced by the greatest of tortures. And the entire course of Jesus’ agony, as described in this Work, shows that it was the immense bodily pain that stopped the breath and the heart of the Son of Man.

Pity and emotion overwhelm the Christian reader before these magnificent pages, with medical style, of Maria Valtorta’s manuscript.

Rome, 1/23/1952

Nicola Pende

He continued thereafter to correspond with Maria Valtorta[12] and to visit her.

His interventions in favor of the publication[edit | edit source]

Professor Nicola Pende was involved through his advice in the publication of the work. He was the one who suggested the title "Poem of Jesus" which appears on the first volume of the first edition (1956). But since this title already existed for a small poetic composition, and its author protested, it was revised by Father Berti to: "The Poem of the Man-God." Thus formulated and revised, it suited Maria Valtorta herself, who approved and adopted it.

At the time of the Indexing of this first edition (1960), Father Berti thought it wise to bring the work into the scientific sphere because of the phenomenon of visions that inspired it. But to qualify the edition as “scientific,” the approval of a scientist from the secular cultural sphere was needed. It was then that Father Berti took a risky initiative, which Maria Valtorta would certainly have refused had she been aware. Through Nicola Pende, he contacted the Italian Society of Parapsychology (Study of psychic paranormal phenomena) and succeeded in interesting its Secretary General, Luciano Raffaele, in the writings of Maria Valtorta. The latter went as far as promising to write a monograph. The reaction from Maria Valtorta was swift; who abhorred spiritism[13]. Although she was already in a state of prostration, she exclaimed upon Luciano Raffaele’s entry: "va'via, va'via!" which translates as: "go away, go away!" with a commanding connotation of the type: "Get lost, get lost!"[14].

Points in Debate[edit | edit source]

In his report of October 17, 1957 commissioned by the Holy Office, Father Augustin Bea (future cardinal) attributes the medical knowledge demonstrated by Maria Valtorta "to her engagement as a volunteer nurse in 1917: 'Her activity with the Red Cross gave her a very concrete knowledge of diseases and sufferings.'"

The "Samaritan nurses" (infermiere samaritane) to which Maria Valtorta and her mother belonged were volunteers trained in first aid and basic care, mainly engaged during the First World War to assist civilian and military wounded. It therefore seems that simple first-aid training could hardly allow Maria Valtorta to describe "like an expert, a phenomenology that few confirmed doctors could expose: the scene of Jesus’ agony on the cross"[15].

Notes and references[edit | edit source]

  1. ↑ Medical specialty that deals with the treatment of disorders of the endocrine system composed of glands and organs producing hormones (pituitary gland, thyroid, adrenal glands...)
  2. ↑ Dysfunctions or pathological lesions whose causes largely depend on the action of genetic factors.
  3. ↑ Policlinico Umberto I is the most important hospital in Rome and Italy. It houses a faculty of medicine and surgery.
  4. ↑ Also called "La Sapienza" or Rome I. It was founded in 1303 (the Sorbonne in Paris was founded in 1257). It currently has about 150,000 students, 21 faculties, as many museums, and 155 libraries.
  5. ↑ Source: Patrimonio dell'Archivio storico {it}.
  6. ↑ Eugenics: a set of genetic techniques aimed at artificially intervening and selecting to improve the human species.
  7. ↑ The paraplegia or paralysis of Maria Valtorta’s limbs was due to the iron bar blow she received, 29 years earlier, from a young anarchist.
  8. ↑ She had left school at nearly 16 years old, on February 23, 1913.
  9. ↑ See EMV 37 in particular.
  10. ↑ EMV 44.
  11. ↑ EMV 609.
  12. ↑ His correspondence remains unpublished to date (2024).
  13. ↑ Maria Valtorta, Autobiography, 2021, EV, pp. 344-346.
  14. ↑ Emilio Pisani, Pro e contro Maria Valtorta {it}, 2017, CEV, pp. 30-33.
  15. ↑ Opinion of Father Augustin Bea, annotated and documented translation, p. 3.

Person who is not religious or a non-religious affair.

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