Where you find the extraordinary, you will find the Holy Spirit guiding the way. And so it was with Blessed Bartolo Longo, who was in the Hands of the Spirit in his personal life, as well as the founder of one of the most famous and visited Sanctuaries in the history of the Church, especially by Italians and pilgrims from all over the world.

As we seek him, we find him being guided by the Holy Spirit. His biographer says of him: "Bartolo Longo was guided by the Spirit as much through the desert as the rich harvest, and through the dark night as in the radiant midday light. He was conscious of this adventure and he wanted to live it to the full." He wanted to live it to the full! But living it to the full, not even he realized how far he would go. Before the consecration of the new church, in 1891, he wrote:

"For fifteen years we were continually astonished by the phenomenon that was occurring inside of us without clearly understanding its laws or the nature and force of its purpose. What was that secret impulse, persistent and untiring, that for so many years had driven us to build this church?" (referring to the Chapel in Pompeii, which he built)