SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
Tomorrow, an Italian boy who died in 2006 becomes the Catholic Church's first millennial saint - in other words, the first saint from a generation of smartphones, social media and the internet. Just 15-years-old when he died, Carlo Acutis had been nicknamed God's influencer or the Saint of the internet for how he promoted Catholic miracles online. He'll be canonized by Pope Leo at a mass in St. Peter's Square, attended by tens of thousands of faithful. NPR's Ruth Sherlock reports on Acutis' family and the people from around the world who are visiting the tomb of this modern-day saint.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Singing in non-English language).
RUTH SHERLOCK, BYLINE: Assisi, the Italian hilltop town has long been a draw for the Catholic faithful.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Singing in non-English language).
SHERLOCK: This woman singing gave up a life in Germany to busk here and feel closer to God.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Singing in non-English language).
SHERLOCK: This is a town of religious art and Catholic saints, the birthplace of St. Francis of Assisi and St. Clare, who both founded religious orders. Shops burst with rosaries for worship and mugs with saints' faces.
UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: (Praying in non-English language).
SHERLOCK: And now it is also the home to the Catholic Church's first millennial saint.
UNIDENTIFIED GROUP: (Praying in non-English language).
SHERLOCK: In this 11th century church of Santa Maria Maggiore, Carlo Acutis' tomb jars with its surroundings of old stone and broken frescoes. His angular casket has been made to look like it's levitating, as if it's ripped off from a rougher stone slab below, and now hovers higher up the wall with a bright white light emanating from it.
(SOUNDBITE OF BEADS CLINKING)
SHERLOCK: A visitor from the Philippines collects fistfuls of prayer beads from her bag and, to bless them, touches them to the glass paneled side of Acutis' tomb.
Through the glass, you can see the body of Carlo Acutis. He's dressed like an ordinary teenager, in jeans and sneakers and a hoodie. And his face and hands have been reconstructed with silicon, so he looks perfectly preserved.
(CROSSTALK)
SHERLOCK: Born in 1991 in London and raised in Milan in Italy, Acutis was just 15-years-old when he died of leukemia in 2006.
MARY KAVANAGH: My friend had a son who was christened in the same baptismal font as Carlo in London.
SHERLOCK: Outside the church, Mary Kavanagh says she's come to his tomb to pray for all young people and, in particular, those who feel lost.
KAVANAGH: I think Carlo, for me, kind of summarizes someone who, at such a young age, we're so sure of what he believed in.
SHERLOCK: Yeah.
KAVANAGH: (Crying) And I think there's so many - sorry - young people who...
SHERLOCK: It's OK.
KAVANAGH: ...Who just get lost...
SHERLOCK: Yeah.
KAVANAGH: ...Who just don't know who they are, where they're going, what they're for. And I think it's so amazing to see all these young people coming to visit Carlo because I think he's a great inspiration in these times.
SHERLOCK: It can take hundreds of years to be recognized as a saint. For Acutis, though, it happened so quickly that his parents are still alive. I meet his mother, Antonia Salzano, in the garden of a villa just outside of Assisi.
What's it like to be the mother of a saint?
ANTONIA SALZANO: Of course, it doesn't mean that the mother is saint, but it's a responsibility.
SHERLOCK: For years now, Salzano has been speaking with journalists, promoting her son and his life. She remembers him as a very advanced child.
SALZANO: Three months, first word. Five months, he already was able to speak, and he was also a genius of the computer.
SHERLOCK: By nine years of age, he was learning multiple computer coding languages. And he was an unusual child also for his faith. Salzano, who was not particularly religious back then, says her son would ask her, his grandmother or his nanny to take him to church every day.
SALZANO: Each day, the mass, till he died.
SHERLOCK: Acutis put his technical skills to use to make a website where he catalogued Eucharist miracles. Salzano speaks about Acutis in the present tense. It's clear she still feels close to him and believes he's interceding to help people from beyond the grave, including her.
SALZANO: When he died, I was 39 years old.
SHERLOCK: At that age, Salzano thought that perhaps she couldn't have any more children. But then, aged 43, Acutis came to her in a dream, promising she would be a mother again. A month later, she became pregnant with twins.
SALZANO: It was a gift of Carlo because he does a miracle. Each day, we receive the news of a miracle.
SHERLOCK: To become a saint, the Vatican says, at least two miracles have to occur after death that can't be explained by science. In Acutis' case, the Vatican cites the recoveries of a 4-year-old Brazilian boy with a serious pancreatic malformation and a 21-year-old Costa Rican woman who suffered a bicycle accident. The mother of the young boy and the injured woman had both prayed to Acutis for help.
DOMENICO SORRENTINO: The miracles, which are the guarantee that comes from God.
SHERLOCK: Domenico Sorrentino is the archbishop of Assisi, and he says, saints are from God, but who becomes a saint is also political.
SORRENTINO: This depends on the strategy of the church to put in the eyes of the people saints that could speak to our sensitivity.
SHERLOCK: The right saint for the right era - Acutis lived during the rise of the internet, of mobile phones and of social media, and now the church hopes his canonization will bring more young people to the faith.
ANTHONY FIGUEIREDO: Whenever we take the heart relic, thousands come.
SHERLOCK: Monsignor Anthony Figueiredo with the Diocese of Assisi is in charge of the official relic of Acutis. It's Acutis' pericardium, the heart's protective coat, kept in an ornate case.
FIGUEIREDO: It's a beautiful gold reliquary with a glass casing. So people who come can certainly see, can touch, can kiss the relic as they wish and according to local norms.
SHERLOCK: The relic has been to some 25 different countries in two years. On planes, it is always hand carried.
FIGUEIREDO: We would never put a saint in hold.
SHERLOCK: Figueiredo says having a modern saint gives people hope.
FIGUEIREDO: He takes us under his wings, knowing us in this age.
SHERLOCK: And he says, in this era, people need hope. Ruth Sherlock, NPR News, Assisi, Italy.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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