Carlo Acutis: The Blessed of the Digital Age

Carlo Acutis, the millennial saint who dedicated his short life to Jesus and helping the poor and needy, reminds us how much we need saints in the modern world.

When we talk about saints, we are used to imagining them all having lived long before we were born. Since childhood, we have seen pictures depicting them dressed in long robes, tunics, and sometimes armour, immortalised by great masters of painting on canvases and frescoes, sculpted in marble and wood by excellent sculptors and skilled craftsmen, or simply handed down to popular devotion on holy cards and sacred depictions by unknown artists who died centuries ago. But there are also modern saints, such as Carlo Acutis, the millennial saint beatified in October 2020, a boy like many others passionate about computers (one of his attributes is a personal computer…) active on social networks like all his peers but driven by a rare vocation and religious fervour.

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Tapestry for small picture 50×40 cm Carlo Acutis

Tapestry representing Blessed Carlo Acutis, made in Italy.

Carlo loved Jesus; he saw in the Holy Eucharist his Highway to Heaven, and considered the Madonna the “only woman in my life“. A boy who spent his free time going around the city to bring hot meals and comfort to the homeless or serving in soup kitchens for the poor. And he prayed; Carlo prayed a lot, reciting the Holy Rosary every day. Very young, while his peers engaged in decidedly more carefree interests, he organised a travelling exhibition dedicated to Eucharistic Miracles worldwide in collaboration with the Institute of St. Clement I, Pope and Martyr, which has travelled and still travels worldwide as The Exhibition of Eucharistic Miracles of Carlo Acutis. Blessed Carlo Acutis died too soon, too young, and we can only wonder what this exceptional boy would have done if he had only had more time. He has been proposed as the Patron of the Internet, and even in this recognition, we realise how much our modern world still needs saints, men and women capable of living Faith and immersing themselves completely in the human and spiritual experience for themselves and all of us.

The Story of Carlo Acutis

The biography of Carlo Acutis will never require a very thick book to be collected. Yet, there is so much in the life of this special boy that in the few years he was given to live, he managed to leave an indelible mark not only on the lives of those fortunate enough to know him but also on the thousands of people who have only heard of him. Born in London to parents from the upper-middle class of Turin, he grew up in Milan, where he attended school, graduating from the Classical High School. From a young age, he manifested a great love for Jesus and an intense spirituality that led him to obtain his First Communion at just seven years old. While his friends idolised boy bands and football players, his idols were Saints Francisco and Jacinta Marto, the shepherd children of Fatima, Saint Dominic Savio, the youngest non-martyr Catholic saint and pupil of Don Bosco, Saint Aloysius Gonzaga, the patron saint of youth, and Saint Tarcisius, a Roman martyr and patron saint of altar servers, killed as a boy by his pagan peers because he made himself available to bring the Eucharist to imprisoned Christians.

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Statue in resin Saint John Bosco and Saint Dominic Savio 30 cm

Statue of Saint John Bosco and Saint Dominic Savio in painted resin.

The life of Carlo Acutis was made up of the same things that make up the life of any boy: school, friends, affections, passions. And among his passions was, above all, God, which he lived with the freshness of his age but also with impressive awareness and rare maturity. Even when in 2006 he fell ill with fulminant leukaemia at only 15 years old, he offered his suffering to the Pope and the Church. He died in just three days and was buried in the cemetery of Assisi, to be moved a year later to the Church of Santa Maria Maggiore, Sanctuary of the Spoliation, where he rests today.

His beatification process began in 2013, and on 5 July 2018, Carlo was declared venerable by Pope Francis.

The Miracle of Carlo Acutis

The canonisation of Carlo Acutis required a miracle, and the miracle was recognised. It concerns the healing through the intercession of little Matheus, a six-year-old Brazilian boy. The child, suffering from a severe pancreatic malformation, had the opportunity to touch a piece of the pyjama worn by Carlo shortly before he died and stained with his blood. The boy prayed to Carlo to help him get better, and subsequent tests showed that his pancreas had returned perfectly healthy. The Medical Council of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints recognised the miracle through intercession, and on 10 October 2020, Carlo Acutis was declared a saint in his beloved Assisi.

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Medal of Carlo Acutis, polished 925 silver and colourful yarn

This medal is an elegant representation of the Blessed Carlo Acutis.

We too can ask for the intercession of the young saint by reciting the Novena to the Venerable Carlo Acutis for nine days:

Most Holy Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, I thank
You for all the favours and graces You have
enriched the soul of Blessed Carlo Acutis during
his fifteen years spent on this earth, and for
the merits of this beloved Angel of Youth,
grant me the grace that I ardently ask of You… (followed by request)

Modern Saints

We mentioned some young saints when talking about Carlo Acutis and the need we still have today for contemporary saints who make the world a better place. Well, besides Carlo, there are other saints beatified in recent times, such as the young José Sánchez del Río, a boy killed by a government officer during the Cristero War that took place in Mexico between 1926 and 1929 against the restrictive policies imposed on religious freedom by the government. José refused to renounce his Catholic faith and died for it. He was beatified by Pope Benedict XVI in 2005 and canonised by Pope Francis in 2016. Also, Oscar Romero, a Salvadoran Catholic archbishop, was killed by death squads for condemning the government’s violence and was proclaimed a saint by Pope Francis in 2018. Charles Eugène de Foucauld, a French religious who dedicated his life to studying the Tuareg culture and died during an attack by bandits in the desert in the fort he built to defend the defenceless population, was proclaimed blessed by Pope Benedict XVI in 2005 and canonised by Pope Francis in 2022.