An Italian web designer, aged 15, is set to become the first saint of the Catholic Church from the ‘millennial’ generation. On Monday (1), in a ceremony called Ordinary Public Consistory, Pope Francis and the cardinals residing in Rome formally approved the canonization of Carlo Acutis, along with 14 others.
No specific date has been set for Acutis’ canonization, who has been nicknamed the “God’s Influencer” for his work in promoting Catholicism online, but it is likely that he will be proclaimed a saint in 2025.
The consistory on Monday was merely a formality, as Acutis’ cause for sainthood had already been thoroughly examined and approved by the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Causes of Saints. The initial announcement came in May.
Acutis was born to wealthy Italian parents in London in 1991, but the family moved to northern Italy shortly after his birth. His family said that at the age of 7, he asked to receive his first communion.
He went on to attend church and receive communion every day. As he matured, he became interested in computers and the internet, creating a website where he cataloged miracles and apparitions of the Virgin Mary approved by the church throughout history.
According to the Vatican, Acutis was “welcoming and attentive to the poorest and helped the homeless, the needy, and immigrants with the money he saved from his weekly allowance.”
He reportedly used his first savings to buy a sleeping bag for a homeless person he frequently encountered on his way to mass.
Acutis died in October 2006, at the age of 15, in Monza, Italy, from leukemia. Some of the poorer residents of the city whom Acutis helped attended to pay tribute to the teenager at his funeral.
His body rests in an open tomb in Assisi, in central Italy, dressed in jeans and Nike sneakers.
“I am happy to die because I lived my life without wasting a single minute of it on anything that displeased God,” Acutis said before he died.
Pope Francis declared Acutis “blessed” in October 2020, after a miracle attributed to him was approved by the church. This miracle occurred with a boy in Brazil who was cured of a deadly pancreatic disease after he and his mother prayed to a relic of Acutis.
According to the Catholic News Agency, the boy touched the relic and prayed: “I wish I could stop vomiting so much.”
Starting in September, Acutis’ relic will travel to Catholic schools and religious education programs in Brooklyn and Queens, in hopes of inspiring youth.
Source: CBS News