EIGHTY THOUSAND people attended St Peter’s Square at the Vatican for the canonisation mass of Pier Giorgio Frassati and Carlo Acutis on Sunday.
Pope Leo XIV said that the two new saints “encourage us with their words: ‘Not I, but God,’ as Carlo used to say. And Pier Giorgio: ‘If you have God at the centre of all your actions, then you will reach the end.’ This is the simple but winning formula of their holiness. It is also the type of witness we are called to follow, in order to enjoy life to the full and meet the Lord in the feast of heaven.”
In his homily, the Pope read the first Sunday reading from the book of Wisdom, and likened the two new saints to King Solomon. He also recalled other saints who made sacrifices, “keeping nothing for themselves”.
Young people, he said, often faced crossroads in their lives, and had to make difficult choices. Both saints invited everyone, and especially young people, “not to squander our lives, but to direct them upwards and make them masterpieces”.
Acutis, who died of acute leukaemia, aged 15, and who had created a website documenting more than 100 eucharistic miracles in 17 languages, was beatified in 2020 (News, 9 October 2020).
The beatification process was launched in 2013 for the London-born teenager, and approved by Pope Francis in February 2020, after the recognition of a miracle involving the cure of a Brazilian boy. The canonisation of Acutis had been scheduled for 27 April, but was delayed after the death of Pope Francis.
Pope Leo said of Acutis that “he grew up naturally integrating prayer, sport, study, and charity into his days as a child and young man.”
Frassati died in July 1925, aged 24. He was a Lay Dominican known for charitable work and social action. Pope John Paul II recognised the miracle, where a man was cured of tuberculosis, and Frassati was beatified in St Peter’s Square in 1990.
Referring to Frassati, the Pope said: “Pier Giorgio’s life is a beacon for lay spirituality.”