{"id":22951,"date":"2025-03-29T12:46:47","date_gmt":"2025-03-29T18:46:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/crowds-flock-to-newest-catholic-saint-in-assisi\/"},"modified":"2025-03-29T18:46:47","modified_gmt":"2025-03-29T18:46:47","slug":"crowds-flock-to-newest-catholic-saint-in-assisi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/crowds-flock-to-newest-catholic-saint-in-assisi\/","title":{"rendered":"Crowds flock to newest Catholic saint in Assisi"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Worshippers
Worshippers pay their respects at the tomb of 15-year-old Carlo Acutis, an Italian boy who died in 2006 of leukemia, in Assisi, Italy, on Saturday, March 1, 2025. (AP Photo\/Gregorio Borgia)<\/span>Gregorio Borgia<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

ASSISI, Italy \u2013 Pilgrims have been pouring into this medieval hilltop town to venerate not only two of the Catholic Church\u2019s most celebrated saints, Francis and Clare, but its newest \u2013 Carlo Acutis, the first millennial saint, who will be canonized on April 27.<\/p>\n

\u201cSt. Francis, St. Clare, of course, important saints who marked an epoch \u2013 but that\u2019s far removed from today\u2019s teens. Carlo is like the kids,\u201d said Maria Rosario Riccio, a mother and educator who was visiting Acutis\u2019 shrine recently with a 50-strong parish youth group from southern Italy. \u201cHe\u2019s a near-saint of our time, who can show teens that it\u2019s possible to love Jesus while being a regular youth.\u201d<\/p>\n

The group lined up to enter the Santuario della Spogliazione \u2013 a somber church, also known as Santa Maria Maggiore, marking the spot where more than 800 years ago St. Francis renounced his family\u2019s wealth. There, they prayed by the monument where Acutis\u2019 body is on view, wearing jeans, a sweatshirt and sneakers.<\/p>\n

On that Saturday, hundreds filed past \u2013 a priest and his parishioners from the Azores islands, a nun from Colombia and her Passionist sisters, a family with two teens from near Venice. Some clutched rosaries, others took selfies or touched the protective glass in front of the seemingly sleeping young man, who died of leukemia at 15 in 2006 and is generating a devotion that astonishes even Assisi\u2019s bishop.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m seeing here a volcano of grace erupting \u2026 I can\u2019t believe my eyes,\u201d said the Rev. Domenico Sorrentino. When he became bishop two decades ago, the church next to his residence just off the main street was \u201cforgotten\u201d by the throngs that visited the monumental Basilica of St. Francis.<\/p>\n

Over the last year, more than a million pilgrims paid homage to Acutis, Sorrentino said, drawn by \u201chis smiling way of living our faith.\u201d<\/p>\n

The teen\u2019s happy image, usually in a red polo shirt and carrying a backpack, is as popular in souvenir shops across town as Francis in his simple brown habit.<\/p>\n

One store owner picked up a blessed icon the first time she went to the shrine and keeps it glued to her cash register.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was really curious about this new saint who attracts youth,\u201d Silvia Balducci said.<\/p>\n

Both the church and his family describe Acutis as an exceptionally devout but otherwise regular Italian boy, who\u2019s working miracles after his untimely death precisely by drawing youth to faith when most of his contemporaries are abandoning organized religion.<\/p>\n

\u201cCarlo wasn\u2019t an alien, he was a normal person. But if it\u2019s illuminated by the light of Christ, a life becomes extraordinary,\u201d his mom, Antonia Salzano Acutis, told The Associated Press. \u201cWe always pray to the saints, and in the end, what did saints do? They opened the doors of their lives to Christ.\u201d<\/p>\n

She quoted one of her son\u2019s favorite phrases: \u201c\u2018Everyone is born an original, but many die photocopies.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe saint is one who didn\u2019t die like a photocopy, who realized that project of holiness that God established in eternity for each of us, as we all should,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Not an observant Catholic herself when she had him, Acutis used to joke with her husband that their young son was \u201ca little Buddha\u201d because of his unselfishness, attention to others, and cheerful obedience.<\/p>\n

He developed a precocious interest in faith, such as wanting to enter every church to \u201csay hi\u201d to Jesus and Mary. Later, he started attending Mass, adoring the Blessed Sacrament and praying the rosary daily \u2013 while also entertaining with jokes his friends who were less interested in religion and more into going to nightclubs with their girlfriends and smoking an occasional joint.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was a bit of a way of hiding his faith life, because Carlo knew that his friends couldn\u2019t understand,\u201d his mother said. \u201cBut Carlo was a witness, a silent witness through the value of friendship, through the value of generosity, helping his classmates in school, defending the teens who were bullied.\u201d<\/p>\n

Acutis often helped the homeless and was uninterested in the trappings common for a wealthy child in Milan, one of Europe\u2019s fashion and business capitals. He asked his parents to donate to the poor what they would have spent for a second pair of sneakers for him, and insisted he wanted to teach catechism at his parish instead of going on skiing holidays at fancy resorts like his peers.<\/p>\n

That denial of privilege is a parallel with St. Francis, to whom Acutis was so devoted that he asked to be buried in Assisi, said the Rev. Enzo Fortunato, who spent most of his religious career there and heads the pontifical committee for World Children\u2019s Day.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd there are more similarities with St. Francis. St. Francis left the churches and went to the squares to preach. Carlo Acutis prophetically realized that today the public squares are online, on the Web,\u201d Fortunato said. \u201cThat\u2019s where youth are, that\u2019s where people are, so he lives and brings the Gospel in those squares. That\u2019s one of the reasons he will become the patron of the Web, internet and social media.\u201d<\/p>\n

Particularly devout to the eucharist and wanting to share the Catholic belief that Jesus is literally present in it, Acutis created an online exhibit about miracles where the bread and wine became flesh and blood throughout the centuries. It\u2019s been used in thousands of parishes worldwide, his mother said.<\/p>\n

For her, his being \u201ca bridge to Jesus\u201d \u2013 even in his terminal illness, which he faced without complaining, certain of eternal life \u2013 is a more important legacy than any miracles or supernatural signs.<\/p>\n

To become a saint, however, miracles do need to be attested. One in Acutis\u2019 canonization process was the healing of a Costa Rican student from a bicycle accident in Italy after her mother prayed to him, Sorrentino said.<\/p>\n

Sabina Falcetta goes often to Acutis\u2019 shrine from the nearby city of Perugia with a group of fellow mothers to pray for their children.<\/p>\n

\u201cCarlo Acutis gives us peace,\u201d she said. \u201cMost importantly he gives us the certainty that God is a good father. And you can\u2019t ask for more.\u201d<\/p>\n

As she talked outside the sanctuary, a confirmation group from Lake Garda in northern Italy was praying in a circle by a cutout of Acutis in his jeans and backpack standing by a larger-than-life monstrance.<\/p>\n

One of the catechists, Veronica Abraham, said she had been teaching about both St. Francis and Acutis, focusing on the teen\u2019s charity and his custom of sitting down to chat with anyone who looked lonely, \u201csince even a ciao is important for those who are alone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her son Mario Girardi, 13, said he was really struck by the fact that Acutis \u2013 when only a couple of years older than him \u2013 \u201cspoke with everyone, didn\u2019t let anything bother him but helped everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

While he\u2019s not considering the priesthood, Girardi does go to church every Sunday and plans to \u201calways stay in this mindset\u201d \u2013 maybe even going to daily Mass.<\/p>\n

Would he want to become a saint, too?<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, let\u2019s hope. Yes, right? Never say never, who knows,\u201d the boy said, grinning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Acutis, the first millennial saint, is a teen whose ordinariness is the draw<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22952,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-22951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22951\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22951"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=22951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}