When presenting his new book “Carlo Acutis in the footsteps of Francesco and Chiara of Assisi: Originals, not photocopies”, the Bishop of Assisi (Italy), Bishop Domenico Sorrentino highlighted that 900,000 people visited the tomb of the future saint in the Sanctuary of the Undressing (of dispossession), in that Italian city.
The Sanctuary of Dispossession is so called because it is the place where Saint Francis of Assisi—in the midst of a public trial that his father, Pietro di Bernardone, accused him of giving his wealth to the poor—stripped of his clothes, as an expression of complete trust in God.
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“Our sanctuary received 900,000 visitors this last year: that is why this book is a kind of ‘textbook’ to help understand what has happened in Assisi,” said the prelate, according to the website of the Franciscan Province of Umbria and Sardinia.
Bishop Sorrentino presented his book on December 18 in the Hall of Honor of the Donini Palace in Perugia, an event in which Brother Francesco Piloni, Provincial Minister of the order of the Friars Minor of Umbria and Sardinia, also participated; Marcello Signorelli, senior lecturer in economic policy at the University of Perugia; and Stefania Proietti, president of the Umbria Region.
According to the diocese of Assisithe prelate explained that Carlo Acutis rests in that city in Italy “because he wanted to follow in the footsteps of these two saints (Saint Francis and Saint Clare). He has breathed his spirituality and translated it as a young man of our time could translate it. His life is a normal, everyday life, like that of many young people, but with a focus: the encounter with Jesus and also the devotion to Mary.”
The bishop also specified that he wanted to write this book as “preparation for canonization, and also explain the meaning of the Sanctuary of Dispossession in which his remains are found.”
At the presentation of the book, Bishop Sorrentino highlighted that “when we think of Francis and Clare and their legacy, we always imagine people in the habit, cloistered nuns or even lay people of the third secular order.”
“Carlo is none of this, because he is a Franciscan, if we may say so, at heart: his mother says that he was in love with the song of the creatures to the point of declaring it his most beautiful poem,” he added.
In the book, the Franciscans explain, the bishop of Assisi answers frequently asked questions such as: Why is Carlo Acutis buried in Assisi, in the Sanctuary of Dispossession? What relationship exists between the young Milanese who will soon be a saint and the saints? of Assisi?, and reveals unpublished details of some moments that occurred after his death.
Br. Francesco Piloni points out about the book that “a very simple thing caught my attention: when Carlo goes to the monasteries with the cloistered nuns, he asks for prayers for his companions, because ‘they don’t have Jesus’.”
“I would very much like Carlo, together with Francesco, in his hiding place, in the power of prayer, to make noise, to come to disturb that terrible silence that makes us feel good, but a feeling of good so relative, without hope, that it makes shipwreck the desire for a future that young people must have before their eyes, but that they must see before the rest of us.
You can purchase the book (in Italian) at this link.
Carlo Acutis is a young blessed and future saint who was born in 1991 in London (England). Shortly after, his family moved to Milan (Italy). Since he was little, he approached technology and created a virtual exhibition on Eucharistic miracles.
As a teenager, Carlo was diagnosed with leukemia, and offered his sufferings for the Pope and the Church.
After his death in 2006, at only 15 years old, his figure began to inspire many young people to bring the message of Christ to the digital sphere, gaining great popularity.
In July 2018, Pope Francis declared him venerable. He was beatified in Assisi (Italy) where his remains rest, on October 10, 2020.
The canonization of Acutis is scheduled for Sunday, April 27 at 10:30 a.m. in St. Peter’s Square, in the Vatican.
Walter Sánchez Silva
I have been a husband since 2008. My wife and I have three children here and one who went to heaven in 2023, before he was born. Since I joined ACI Prensa in 2005, I have had the opportunity to cover various events of the Catholic Church. Among them, the World Youth Days in Cologne, Madrid and Rio de Janeiro and the apostolic trips of Pope Benedict XVI to Mexico and of Pope Francis to South Korea. I have been sent to the Vatican to cover the Family synods, in 2015; of the Amazon, in 2019 and that of Synodality, in 2023. I closely follow the situation of the Catholic Church in Nicaragua, which suffers persecution from the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega, as well as current ecclesiastical events in the region.