Perspective

Bernard Ruffin, the author of Padre Pio: The True Story, is a non-fiction author and an assistant pastor at a Lutheran Church in Washington, D.C. He has written a number of books concerning historical and religious matters and teaches history at a high school in Virginia. Ruffin's book indicates a number of biases readers should be aware of. First, many readers will doubt that miracles happen at all. Those readers should know that as a Christian minister, Ruffin strongly disagrees. While he acknowledges that strong evidence is needed to justify belief in the miraculous, he clearly thinks such evidence is already available.

However, Ruffin is comfortable with the miraculous to a degree that exceeds the comfort level of even devout Christians. While admitting that he may have biases, Ruffin seems to accept most of the miraculous claims of Pio's followers, which amounts to a belief that the...