From coding to canonization: The extraordinary life of Carlo Acutis

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VATICAN CITY (AP) — A 15-year-old computer whiz, Carlo Acutis, was declared the first millennial saint Sunday. Acutis, who died in 2006 after an acute case of leukemia, has been dubbed “God’s Influencer” because of his savvy use of information technology to spread the Catholic faith. It was Pope Leo XIV’s first canonization ceremony.

An ordinary life that became extraordinary

Acutis was born on May 3, 1991, in London to a wealthy, but not particularly observant Catholic family. His Italian parents, Antonia Salzano and Andrea Acutis, had moved to London from Italy in 1988 when his father was appointed corporate finance executive at financal firm Lazard Brothers & Co. Ltd.

The family moved back to Milan soon after young Carlo was born. Carlo’s mother said her son had a normal, happy childhood, albeit one that increasingly showed his religious fervor, thanks particularly to the influence of his Polish Catholic nanny.

“He had an ordinary life, like all of us. But an ordinary life that became extraordinary,” Salzano says.

A ‘Little Buddha’ who insists on daily prayer

Acutis was an obedient child who insisted on going to Mass daily as a youngster. His mother called him “Little Buddha” because of his calm, joyful demeanor.

He insisted on receiving First Communion, one of the main sacraments of the Catholic Church, at the young age of seven. He would pray before and after Mass before the Eucharist, a practice known as Eucharistic adoration.

A computer whiz who spread the faith

While he enjoyed regular pastimes for his age — hiking, video games, soccer and joking around with friends – Acutis also taught catechism in a local parish and did outreach to the homeless.

His father has said Carlo was particularly interested in computer science and devoured college-level books on programming even as a youngster. One of his main tech legacies is a computer website documenting more than 100 so-called Eucharistic miracles recognized by the church, a project he completed at a time when such sites were the domain of professionals.

A flu that becomes leukemia

In October 2006, at age 15, Acutis fell ill with what his parents thought at first was just a case of the flu. He was hospitalized and quickly diagnosed with acute and aggressive leukemia. Within days, he was dead.

His funeral was held in Milan, but he was eventually entombed in Assisi, where the family vacationed. The hilltop town was already a major pilgrimage destination because of its ties to St. Francis of Assisi. Acutis’ presence has drawn millions.

His glass-fronted tomb reinforces to viewers the ordinariness of Acutis’ life: He’s wearing jeans, Nike sneakers and a sweatshirt.

A fast-track to sainthood

Up until the pontificate of St. John Paul II, sainthood candidates regularly had to wait decades if not centuries to be canonized, well after a “cult of sanctity” had grown around them. This groundswell of devotion from ordinary faithful signaled to the church that there was popular conviction of someone’s holiness, which would then trigger an official church investigation into the person’s life, the first step in the sainthood process.

In the case of Acutis, the dynamic was seemingly reversed: The church investigation into Acutis’ virtues began in Milan in 2013, at the request of some family, friends and priests, just after the mandatory five-year waiting period after someone’s death.

It then seemed as if the process itself created the “cult of sanctity” around Acutis. The campaign to make him a saint went viral on social media, reinforcing his popularity. There is no doubt that the church saw in Acutis a relatable role model for young people in the digital age.

Acutis was named “venerable” in 2018. He was then declared “blessed” in 2020 after the Vatican’s saint-making office declared that a child in Brazil who recovered from a pancreatic deformation was “scientifically inexplicable” and a miracle attributed to Acutis’ intercession.

Last year, the church paved his way to sainthood by declaring a second miracle — the complete healing of a Costa Rican student in Italy from major head trauma in a bicycle accident after her mother prayed at Acutis’ tomb.

Another Italian who died young also canonized

Acutis was canonized along with another popular Italian who died young, Pier Giorgio Frassati.

Frassati, who lived from 1901-1925, was born into a prominent Turin family — his father founded the La Stampa newspaper. But he was devoted to serving the poor and carrying out acts of charity while spreading his faith to his friends. An ardent anti-Fascist, Frassati died at the age of 24 of polio.

Frassati has a special connection to Leo. After the first World War, he joined the Italian People’s Party, a Catholic-inspired political party that promoted the church’s social teachings based on the principles of Pope Leo XIII’s most famous encyclical, Rerum Novarum. The text addressed workers’ rights and capitalism at the dawn of the industrial revolution.

Leo, the former Robert Prevost, has pointed to his namesake and the encyclical as an inspiration driving his own pontificate, pointing to the parallels of the concerns about fundamental rights in the age of artificial intelligence and the technological revolution.

Frassati was beatified in 1990 by St. John Paul II.

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