Pope Francis paved the way for the canonization of the first saint of the millennial generation on Thursday, attributing a second miracle to a 15-year-old Italian computer whiz who died of leukemia in 2006.

Carlo Acutis, born on May 3, 1991, in London and then moved with his Italian parents to Milan as a child, was the youngest contemporary person to be beatified by Francis in Assisi in 2020.

Acutis, who died of acute leukemia on Oct. 12, 2006, was put on the road to sainthood after Pope Francis approved the first miracle attributed to him: The healing of a 7-year-old Brazilian boy from a rare pancreatic disorder after coming into contact with an Acutis’ relic, a piece of one of his T-shirts.

According to Vatican News, the second miracle recognized on Thursday is related to a woman from Costa Rica, who in July 2022 made a pilgrimage to Acutis’ tomb in Assisi to pray for the healing of her daughter, who had suffered severe head trauma after falling from her bicycle. The young woman started showing signs of recovery immediately after her mother’s plea.

so the vatican has all of this kids clothes preserved as relics and they cut off pieces of his t-shirts so they can mail them to cancer patients. just imagining like, spongebob, batman, metallica t-shirts being guarded as holy relics in rome for centuries to come.

  • edge [he/him]
    hexbear
    44
    1 month ago

    So his "miracles" were posthumous and had nothing to do with the internet?

    • FunkyStuff [he/him]
      hexbear
      50
      1 month ago

      There are very few miracles that happened in the lives of saints. The point of the whole 2 miracles to canonize a saint is that once you die, people who think you went to heaven pray for your intercession. If you really are in heaven then you'd ask God to make the miracles happen. Then the idea is that if a miracle happens, it was because of the saint's intercession. But this only works if people are ONLY praying for the purported saint's intercession.

      It's kinda a weird system, I've gone to some Masses hosted by an order of nuns that was founded by a nun who is now in the process of being beatified. They asked the attendees to pray for her intercession, but you could ONLY pray for her intercession, no one else's, or else we don't know who interceded.

      • ClimateChangeAnxiety [he/him, they/them]
        hexbear
        30
        1 month ago

        Ya know, that explains why there are so many fucking saints, and also is absolutely bullshit.

        We’ve gotta switch to only counting the ones who actually performed their miracles while alive, that’ll make the numbers a lot more reasonable too

      • Absolute@lemmygrad.ml
        hexbear
        13
        1 month ago

        “Beatified” should also be a term for when you spend 2 hours doing heavy glam makeup for the club

      • edge [he/him]
        hexbear
        1
        edit-2
        30 days ago

        Oh I thought it was primarily "miracles" they performed in life, that later need to be "proven" to canonize them.

    • Redcuban1959 [any]
      hexbear
      31
      1 month ago

      The miracles have nothing to do with the internet, but Carlo was a programmer, he made a website for his local church and he was unfortunely a gamer.

      • edge [he/him]
        hexbear
        2
        30 days ago

        It seems weird to call someone the patron saint of something if their saintly status has nothing to do with that thing.

        • Redcuban1959 [any]
          hexbear
          1
          30 days ago

          I believe it's more about the person themselves than the miracles. For example, Joseph (Jesus' legal father not the Egyptian dude) worked as a carpenter for most of his life. That's why they decided to give him the title of patron saint of workers and fatherhood. In some countries, the title is related to the place where the person lived or was born.