Cardinals approve canonization of Carlo Acutis, date to be decided

Rome Newsroom, Jul 1, 2024 / 12:10 pm

The College of Cardinals gave a positive vote to the canonization of Blessed Carlo Acutis on Monday after Pope Francis recognized last month a second miracle attributed to the millennial’s intercession — the final step before his canonization date can be set.

Pope Francis said July 1 that the date for the canonization Mass of the computer-coding teenager will be announced at a later time, the Vatican said.  

Acutis could be canonized during the Catholic Church’s 2025 Jubilee Year.

The College of Cardinals assented to the canonizations of 15 people, including Blessed Carlo Acutis, during a consistory at the Vatican on the morning of July 1.

The pope decreed that the 14 other blesseds, which includes the 11 “Martyrs of Damascus,” will be declared saints on Sunday, Oct. 20.

Acutis, who died in 2006 at the age of 15, was beatified in a ceremony at the Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi on Oct. 10, 2020.

In a May 23 decree, Pope Francis approved a second miracle through the Italian boy’s intercession, paving the way for him to become the first millennial saint.

A 21-year-old woman from Costa Rica, Valeria Valverde, was miraculously healed through Acutis’ intercession after she was close to dying from a serious head injury sustained in a bicycle accident while studying in Florence in 2022.

After the woman underwent an emergency craniotomy to reduce intracranial pressure, the family was told that her situation was very critical and that she could die at any moment, according to the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Causes of Saints.

Six days after the accident, Valverde’s mother went on a pilgrimage to Assisi to pray for the healing of her daughter at the tomb of Blessed Carlo Acutis, leaving a written note.

On that same day, Valverde began to breathe on her own and on the following day she recovered the use of her upper limbs and partly recovered her speech.

Valverde was discharged from the intensive care unit 10 days after her mother’s pilgrimage and underwent further tests that showed that the hemorrhagic right temporal cortical contusion in her brain had completely disappeared.

Contrary to medical predictions, Valverde spent only one week in physical therapy and on Sept. 2, 2022, two months after her accident, she went on a pilgrimage to Acutis’ tomb in Assisi with her mother to celebrate her complete healing.