We now have two new inspirational young men who died in the prime of their youth that have been declared by Pope Leo to have achieved the rank of Saints in the universal church. One lived at the dawn of the 20th century, smoked a pipe, climbed mountains and sat in Eucharistic adoration. One lived at the closing of the 20th Century played computer games, dressed as Spider-man and sat in Eucharistic adoration.
On September 7, 2025 in the 21st century they came together in a historic display of the recognition of their holiness as an example for fellow Catholics to imitate.
Today we look to Saint Pier Giorgio Frassati and Saint Carlo Acutis: a young man from the early 20th century and a teenager from our own day, both in love with Jesus and ready to give everything for him.
Both Pier Giorgio and Carlo cultivated their love for God and for their brothers and sisters through simple acts, available to everyone: daily Mass, prayer, and especially Eucharistic Adoration.Even when illness struck them and cut short their young lives, not even this stopped them nor prevented them from loving, offering themselves to God, blessing him and praying to him for themselves and for everyone.Dear friends, Saints Pier Giorgio Frassati and Carlo Acutis are an invitation to all of us, especially young people, not to squander our lives, but to direct them upwards and make them masterpieces. They encourage us with their words: “Not I, but God,” as Carlo used to say. And Pier Giorgio: “If you have God at the center 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.POPE LEO XIV, Holy Mass with Canonizations (7 September 2025)
They lived here on earth while other interesting events happened in the world around Saints Pier and Carlos.
The Year in which Pier Giorgio Frassati was born was
1901
The dawn of the 20th Century.
Here’s what happened the year he was born.
Picture This
June 24 -The first showing of Picasso‘s paintings in Paris as the 19-year-old Spanish artist exhibits his work at Ambroise Vollard‘s gallery.
News of the World
July 1 – The first United Kingdom Fingerprint Bureau is established at Scotland Yard, the Metropolitan Police headquarters in London, by Edward Henry.
September 7 – The Boxer Rebellion in Qing dynasty China officially ends with the signing of the Boxer Protocol.
September 14 – Vice President Theodore Roosevelt becomes the 26th president of the United States, upon President William McKinley‘s death.
October 24 – Michigan schoolteacher Annie Edson Taylor goes over Niagara Falls in a barrel and survives.
November 25 – Auguste Deter is first examined by German psychiatrist Dr. Alois Alzheimer, leading to a diagnosis of the condition that will carry Alzheimer’s name.
December 10 – The first Nobel Prize ceremony is held in Stockholm, on the fifth anniversary of Alfred Nobel‘s death.
Arrivals
Teodora Fracasso, Italian Roman Catholic religious professed (d. 1927)
April 6, 1901 – Holy Saturday
Pier Giorgio enters the world
March 26 – Teresa Demjanovich, was an American Ruthenian Greek Catholic Sister of Charity. (d. 1927) Her beatification ceremony, held in Newark, New Jersey, was the first such to take place in the United States.
December 5 –Walt Disney is born (d. 1966)
Departures
January 22 – Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom dies at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight. She is 81 years old and, having ruled for nearly 64 years, will be the second longest-reigning monarch in British history. Her eldest son, Prince Albert Edward, “Bertie”, the longest-serving Prince of Wales to this time, succeeds his mother at the age of 59, reigning as King Edward VII, of the United Kingdom and in innovation the British Dominions and also becoming Emperor of India.
September 6 – William McKinley assassination: American anarchist Leon Czolgosz shoots U.S. President William McKinley at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York. McKinley dies 8 days later.
The Man with the Rubber Head (L’Homme à la tête en caoutchouc), directed by Georges Méliès
On the Airwaves
December 12 – Guglielmo Marconi receives the first trans-Atlantic radio signal, sent from Poldhu, England, to St. John’s, Newfoundland; it is the letter “S” in Morse code.
Publications Hot of the Press
June 28 – G. K. Chesterton marries Frances Blogg at St Mary Abbots, Kensington.
October 23 – Mark Twain receives an honorary doctorate of literature from Yale University. In the same month he moves to Riverdale, New York.
H. G. Wells – The First Men in the Moon is published.
Booker T. Washington – Up from Slavery is published.
Good Sports
The American League repudiates its minor status and competes with the National League as a second major league. The AL abandons four western cities for Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia and Boston. It signs about 30 prominent NL players before the season begins.
The National League violates its constitution in the summer and there will be no major-minor agreement until the 1903 season.
December – numerous minor leagues establish their own National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues, commonly called Minor League Baseball (1902 to date).
Sanctifying Time
May 17 – Benedictine monks of the Solesmes Congregation are publicly lauded by Pope Leo XIII for their scholarly work on Gregorian chant.
The Sound of Music and Other Cultural Milestones
October 19 – Edward Elgar‘s first two Pomp and Circumstance Marches premiere in Liverpool.
“Blaze Away!” m. Abe Holzmann
The Year in which Pier Giorgio Frassati died was
1925
Here’s what happened that year detailed.
And here are some 1925 highlights
May 17, 1925 –Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face or St. Thérèse of Lisieux or St. Thérèse the Little Flower was canonized by Pope Pius XI.
May 20th – C. S. Lewis is elected a fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford, where he tutors in English language and literature until 1954.
May 21st- St. Peter Canisius becomes the 25th Doctor of the Church.
March 25th – Catholic author Flannery O’Connor (March 25, 1925 – August 3, 1964) is born.
June 7th- Venerable Matt Talbot (May 2, 1856 –June 7, 1925) dies.
June 26: Charlie Chaplin‘s The Gold Rush premieres. It is voted the best film of the year by critics in The Film Daily annual poll.
July 4th, Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati, (April 6, 1901 – July 4, 1925) died.
July 18th Adolf Hitler publishes Volume 1 of his personal manifesto Mein Kampf in Germany.
October 1st – J. R. R. Tolkien becomes Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at the University of Oxford. He also publishes an essay called ‘The Devil’s Coach Horses”
October 5th St. Anna Schäffer. She had mystical phenomena developed around her. She was canonized by Pope Benedict XVI on October 21, 2012.
G. K. Chesterton publishes The Everlasting Man
December 11 – Pope Pius XI‘s encyclical Quas primas, on the Feast of Christ the King, is promulgated.
December 30 – MGM’s biblical epic Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ premieres in New York City. It is the most expensive silent film ever made, costing $4 million (around $70 million when adjusted for inflation)
Pope John Paul II beatified Frassati in May 1990 and dubbed him the “Man of the Eight Beatitudes.
This was the year I graduated.
This is the year Blessed Chiara Badano (October 29, 1971 – October 7, 1990) died.
90 Years After Pier was born
A year after his beautifiation
1991
The closing of the 20th Century.
Here’s what happened the year he was born.
Picture This
April 14– In the Netherlands, thieves steal 20 paintings worth $500 million from the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. Less than an hour later they are found in an abandoned car near the museum.
May 25– Opening of the Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin.
News of the World
January 16 – Gulf War: Operation Desert Storm begins with air strikes against Iraq.
February 27 Gulf War: U.S. President Bush declares victory over Iraq and orders a cease-fire. U.S. troops begin to leave the Persian Gulf on March 10.
May 3, 1991
Carlo Acutis enters the world
“God created you one of a kind. Don’t waste your life trying to look like others.”
May 6 – In the U.S., Time magazine publishes “The Thriving Cult of Greed and Power,” an article highly critical of the Scientology movement.
August 6 – Tim Berners-Lee announces the World Wide Web project and software on the alt.hypertext newsgroup. The first website, “info.cern.ch”, is created.
September 19 – Ötzi the Iceman is found in the Alps.
October 29 – NASA‘s Galileo spacecraft makes its closest approach to 951 Gaspra, becoming the first probe to visit an asteroid.
November 24 – Queen lead singer Freddie Mercury dies in London from AIDS induced pneumonia. In an unrelated incident, Kiss drummer Eric Carr dies from heart cancer.
December 25 -Dissolution of the Soviet Union: Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as president of the Soviet Union, from which most republics have already seceded, anticipating the dissolving of the 69-year-old state.
December 26 – Dissolution of the Soviet Union: The Supreme Soviet meets for the last time, formally dissolves the Soviet Union, and adjourns sine die, ending the Cold War. All remaining Soviet institutions eventually cease operation on December 31.
February 14 – The Silence of the Lambs is released and becomes only the third film after It Happened One Night (1934) and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) to win the top five categories at the Academy Awards: Best Picture; Best Director (Jonathan Demme); Best Actor (Anthony Hopkins); Best Actress (Jodie Foster); and Best Adapted Screenplay (Ted Tally). It is also the first, and to date only, Best Picture winner widely considered to be a horror film.
July 3 – Terminator 2: Judgment Day became one of the landmarks for science fiction action films with its groundbreaking visual effects from Industrial Light & Magic.
November 22 – Walt Disney Pictures releases Beauty and the Beast, based on the original fairy tale and Jean Cocteau‘s 1946 film. The film became one of the most prestigious and greatest animated and romantic films in cinema history. It went on to become the first animated film ever nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture.
On the Airwaves
January 27 – Whitney Houston delivers a rousing rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner” during the pre-game ceremonies for Super Bowl XXV. During halftime, ABC broadcast a special ABC News report anchored by Peter Jennings on the progress of the Gulf War. ABC eventually aired the halftime show, headlined by New Kids on the Block on tape delay following the game.
April 20 – An episode of NBC‘s Saturday Night Live guest hosted by actor Steven Seagal immediately becomes infamous due to Seagal being difficult and uncooperative to work with among the cast and crew. Seagal is soon banned from ever appearing on the series again and is branded by SNL creator and producer Lorne Michaels as the “worst host ever”.
September 9–13 The 20th anniversary week of The Price Is Right is celebrated during this week on CBS.
October 25 – Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry dies at the age of 70. After his death, Star Trek: The Next Generation airs a two-part episode of season five, called “Unification“, which features a dedication to Roddenberry.
November 28 – E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial makes its broadcast network television premiere on CBS.
Publications Hot of the Press
- Karen Wynn Fonstad (with J. R. R. Tolkien and Alan Lee) – The Atlas of Middle-earth
- John Grisham – The Firm
- Stephen King – Needful Things
- Peter Kreeft – Prayer: The Great Conversation (1991) — Straight answers to tough questions
- Timothy Zahn – Heir to the Empire
Good Sports
July 9 – The Major League Baseball All-Star Game airs on CBS for the second consecutive year. Emanating from Toronto, it is the second time that the All-Star Game is played outside of the United States, the first being the 1982 All-Star Game in Montreal, Quebec. CBS started their broadcast at the top of the hour with the customary pregame coverage. Because American President George H.W. Bush and Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney were throwing out the first ball, there was a slight delay from the 8:30 p.m. EDT start. The game eventually started about 15–20 minutes late.
July 28– Dennis Martínez of the Montreal Expos pitches the 13th perfect game in major league history, beating the Los Angeles Dodgers 2–0.
Sanctifying Time
Raphael Kalinowski (September 1, 1835 –November 15, 1907) was canonized by Pope John Paul II. He was a Polish Discalced Carmelite friar who founded many Carmelite convents around Poland after their suppression by the Russians.
Pope John Paul II – Centesimus Annus – On the Hundredth Anniversary of Rerum Novarum, 1 May 1991
The Sound of Music and Other Cultural Milestones
November 26 – Michael Jackson releases Dangerous, selling 5 million copies in the first week.
Some Hit Songs
Song- Smells Like Teen Spirit“- Nirvana
Album Heart in Motion– Amy Grant
Song Enter Sandman” – Metallica
Song Place in This World” – Michael W. Smith
The Year in which Carlo Acutis died was
2006
Here’s what happened that year.
Picture This
November 2 – No. 5, 1948 by Jackson Pollock becomes the most expensive painting after it is sold privately for $140 million.
News of the World
January 15 – NASA‘s Stardust mission successfully ends, the first to return dust from a comet.
January 19 – NASA launches the first interplanetary space probe to Pluto, the New Horizons.
March 10 – NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter enters orbit around Mars.
March 21 – Microblogging and social networking service website Twitter was launched.
April 11 The European Space Agency‘s Venus Express spaceprobe enters Venus‘ orbit.
November 8 – Microsoft releases Windows Vista for manufacturing.
November 11 – Sony releases the PlayStation 3.
November 19 – Nintendo releases the Wii.
December 30 – Former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, was executed by hanging.
On the Airwaves
August 27, 2006 – The NBC comedy The Office wins Outstanding Comedy Series and the Fox drama 24 also wins for Outstanding Drama Series at the 58th Primetime Emmy Awards on NBC.
September 11, 2006 – Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy! become the first game shows to be broadcast in High Definition.
September 18, 2006 – The CW network debuts as the sixth broadcast network, merging with UPN (owned by CBS which split in the original Viacom, three days after UPN ceased operations) and The WB (owned by Warner Bros., a day after The WB ceased operations).
November 9, 2006 – Nickelodeon broadcasts a 24-hour marathon of SpongeBob SquarePants starting at 8:00 PM leading to the new episode the following day. The marathon increased Nickelodeon’s ratings to an average of more than 6.7 million viewers and became the network’s highest-rated day ever.
Publications Hot of the Press
- The Boy in the Striped Pajamas –John Boyne
- World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War Max Brooks
- The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town (2006) — story of Ronald “Ron” Keith Williamson -John Grisham
- Cell –Stephen King
- The Sea Within – Peter Kreeft
- New Moon (The Twilight Saga, #2) –Stephenie Meyer
- Fablehaven (Fablehaven, #1) – Brandon Mull
Good Sports
The 2006 World Baseball Classic final 4 teams are Japan, Cuba, Korea and the Dominican Republic, with the United States at 3–3 failing to qualify for the semi-finals. Under the leadership of manager Sadaharu Oh and veterans Ichiro Suzuki and Daisuke Matsuzaka, Japan (5–3) wins the Classic, defeating Cuba (5–3) in the single championship game. Korea at 6–1 has the best overall Classic record.
February 10–26 – The 2006 Winter Olympics are held in Turin, Italy.
May 13 – Major League Baseball introduces a new Mothers’ Day tradition around the league. All players and umpires wore bright pink wristbands, and several players used bright pink bats, which were auctioned off following the day’s play. $350,000 was raised for the Susan G. Komen for the Cure breast cancer charity.
May 20 – Barry Bonds ties Babe Ruth for second place on the career list, and first place among left-handed hitters, with his 714th home run during the Giants’ road game against the Athletics.
Sanctifying Time
Théodore Guérin (October 2, 1798 – May 14, 1856) is canonized. She was a French-American saint and the foundress of the Sisters of Providence of Saint Mary-of-the-Woods, a congregation of Catholic sisters at Saint Mary-of-the-Woods, Indiana.
The Sound of Music and Other Cultural Milestones
February 22 – The one billionth song is downloaded on iTunes; the song is “Speed of Sound” by Coldplay.
June 19 – Taylor Swift released her first single, “Tim McGraw“, at 16 years old.
July 5 – The US television talent show, American Idol, begins its tour.
July 31 – Chicago rock band OK Go release their video for their single “Here It Goes Again“, and the video quickly becomes an internet phenomenon on YouTube.
September 26, 2006 – “Weird Al” Yankovic‘s album Straight Outta Lynwood is released featuring “White & Nerdy”
October 24 – Taylor Swift releases her debut self-titled album at the age of 16, which sold 39,000 in its first week.
November 20 – Love by The Beatles is a soundtrack remix album compiled and remixed as a mashup for the Cirque du Soleil show Love.
Carlo was only beatified 5 years ago on October 10, 2020
95 years after Pier died
30 years after Pier was Beautified
In the end, that’s what these two lived for: the glory of God. And they did it exactly when and where they found themselves. Thanks be to God for placing them so close in time to us, because (in my opinion) a life conformed to Christ is more jarring and convicting the less it looks like a pious holy card.
Give me the saint in sneakers and wearing a Spider-Man Halloween costume; give me the saint scaling a mountainside and goofing off with his pals. Give me a glimpse of Christ alive today.
He’s just like me . . . I need to live like that.
Frassati, Acutis: Just Guys Being Saints (September 5, 2025) Catholic Answers Magazine
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In