http://www.nydailynews.com/2002-03-05/News_and_Views/City_Beat/a-143359.asp 
 
From: News and Views | City Beat | 
Tuesday, March 05, 2002 
 
Stigmata Priest Has Church Buzzing 
By JOYCE SHELBY 
Daily News Staff Writer 
 
The young Croat-born cleric known as the stigmata priest is due at a 
Bensonhurst church next week, and the pastor says he's getting nervous. 
"We're getting a lot of calls," said Msgr. David Cassato, pastor of St. 
Athanasius Catholic Church. "Everyone wants to meet him and have him pray 
over them because of his giftedness. I hear he brings in very big crowds." 
The Rev. Zlatko Sudac, 31, has attracted large audiences since he arrived on 
a Mass tour of the metropolitan area more than five months ago. 
 
Last month, thousands went to Our Lady of Pompeii Church in Greenwich 
Village, where Sudac celebrated two Masses instead of the one that had been 
scheduled. 
 
Incredible Claims Made 
 
Sudac claims to have supernatural gifts, including stigmata, or marks, on 
his body that resemble those on the body of Jesus Christ when he was 
crucified. 
 
The priest claims that the marks bleed spontaneously and that he can heal, 
levitate, be in two places at once and know the future. 
 
Sudac does not give interviews, but the Rev. Giordano Belanich, a priest in 
the Newark Archdiocese, said Sudac received the stigmata on his forehead in 
1999, a year after his ordination, and other gifts followed soon after. 
Cassato said: "I heard about him just recently. A friend who knows of his 
work called and asked if I would be interested in having him come to our 
church. I said, 'Of course.' I thought it would be a nice Lenten reflection 
to have a spiritual uplift for all of us." 
 
Last month, a Long Island church canceled an appearance by Sudac, citing 
limited sanctuary space. 
 
Cassato said he had not met Sudac but did not question accounts of the 
stigmata. "It's a gift," he said. "It's a very unusual, extraordinary gift 
that has been given at times in our church history - to St. Francis of 
Assisi, to Padre Pio." 
 
The Catholic Church has permitted Sudac to continue his tour until May, when 
he returns to his homeland, but has remained silent on his sensational 
claims. 
 
Frank DeRosa, spokesman for the Diocese of Brooklyn and Queens, said: "From 
what I understand, Father Sudac is a priest in good standing. He's been 
speaking at various parishes in the metropolitan area, and there's been a 
rather substantial following. 
 
"There's no indication he's been anything but a good priest. As far as the 
stigmata is concerned, there has been no position taken on that," DeRosa 
said. 
 
Cassato said Sudac would celebrate a Mass and conduct a healing service 
March 13. 
 
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