Transcript

Carlo Acutis was a teenager who loved video games and soccer.

But by 15 years of age, he had done something extraordinary.

He had built a global movement of faith online.

And today, he's on the path to becoming the first millennial saint.

Born in 1991, Carlo Acutis was an ordinary boy with an extraordinary mission.

At a time when many of his peers saw the internet as a tool of entertainment, Carlo saw it as a tool to lead others to God.

He cataloged Eucharistic miracles, creating a virtual exhibition that has been seen around the globe.

Carlo .

Carlos is known everywhere, and why?

Because he's a modern day saint, a 2.0 saint who used social media and new forms of communication for good, placing them in the service of the Gospel and the spreading of the faith.

Carlo's example has quickly become global, and his impact continues to grow.

Despite his global reach, Carlo was a teenager like any other.

He loved sports, his friends, and his PlayStation, but he also had a deep spiritual life, one that his mother, Antonia Salzanno, credits with saving her faith.

Carlo, for me, was like a savior, huh, because his example...

I was very far away from the faith.

Carlo was really the mean, the kind that God usually use to make me understand that, uh, Jesus is really present in the blessed sacrament.

Because before, I was like a Protestant.

I thought that the sacraments were symbols.

Yeah.

Only re-...

rites, you know, and nothing serious, huh?

Instead, through Carlo, I understood the Eucharistic miracles, all the, the way he spoke, the way he spoke about the Eucharist, that really Jesus is present in the blessed sacrament, that his j- real presence.

And this is the reason why I said Carlo, for me, was a savior.

By the age of seven, Carlo had begun attending daily mass and Eucharistic adoration.

His life, as his mother recalls, revolved around the presence of Jesus in the Eucharist.

In fact, we started our faith together, because Carlo did his first holy communion when he was seven years old.

Since then, he started to go to mass each day, to do Eucharistic adoration each day.

Carlo's faith wasn't confined to just attending church.

He believed in putting his love into action, organizing aid for the homeless in Milan at just nine years of age.

Carlo couldn't be- remain indifferent to this fullness, huh.

And, uh, he started to buy sleeping bags, blankets, to, to bring meals to these people.

He was nine years old when he started to organize himself like a charity, domestic charities.

He used to say, "I have everything.

I have a house.

I have the love of my, my parents.

I have all what I need, and these people are without anything.

How can I be, um, you know, quite, uh, peaceful, seeing this fullness?"

In 2020, Carlo Acutis was beatified, and Pope Francis has already announced that he will be canonized a saint soon.

Bishop Domenico Sorrentino reflects on why Carlo chose to be buried in Assisi, following in the footsteps of Saint Francis.

Italian.

Carlo was not from Assisi, but he wanted to come here.

Like Saint Francis, Carlo stripped himself of worldly things, offering himself to God.

Francis and Carlo were two heroes of renunciation.

Francis, because he physically stripped himself of everything to live a life of poverty and love.

Carlo, because he lovingly allowed himself to be stripped even of his own life.

Carlo's connection to Assisi, the home of Saint Francis, runs deep, despite hundreds of years of difference.

In both young men, Bishop Sorrentino says that we see lives lived in humble service to God, a reminder that holiness is accessible to all, even in the modern world.

It was in his final days that Carlo's faith shone brightest.

Diagnosed with leukemia at just 15, he accepted his suffering with grace, and stayed joyful through it all.

And then Carlo said, "I offer my suffer for the p- Church, for the Pope." During the illness, always with a smile, never complaining.

Say, when the, the doctor were asking him, "Are you suffering?" He used to say, uh, "There are people that are suffering much more than I." Always with a smile.

And really, he, he, he, he, he died as a saint.

Carlo's legacy continues to inspire, attracting many young people to his tomb in Assisi, because of the way he lived his life in faith, love, and service, through technology and outside of it.

Carlo Acutis, the first millennial blessed, is proof that even in the digital age, sainthood is possible.