Shia LaBeouf embraces the Catholic faith playing Padre Pio

As it turned out, it wasn’t his career that God wanted to save, LaBeouf believes.

The Franciscan friars he spent time with to prepare for the role made him increasingly curious about the faith that inspired Padre Pio.

They directed him to the Gospel of Matthew and the works of other important Catholic writers, which he devoured.

In the interview, LaBeouf spoke about his view of Jesus, before reading the Gospels, as someone who is “soft, fragile, all loving, all listening” but with “no ferocity, no romance.” What he encountered in the Gospels was a very different, masculine Christ, he said.

The friars also introduced LaBeouf to the Mass. He told Barron he became especially attracted to the Traditional Latin Mass. Unlike the Novus Ordo Masses he attended, he said, the old liturgy struck him as being focused on God, more than the congregation. He said he felt as if someone was sharing a “profound secret” with him, “not selling me a car,” referring to the…