The first millennial saint was a teenage coder from Milan
Carlo Acutis taught himself programming, built websites for his parish and catalogued Eucharistic miracles online before dying of leukaemia at fifteen in 2006. In September 2025 he became the first millennial canonised by the Catholic Church, nicknamed God's influencer, though sceptics question how extraordinary his short life really was.
He was born in London on 3 May 1991 to wealthy Italian parents, Andrea Acutis and Antonia Salzano, whose families were in insurance and publishing, and was baptised in Chelsea two weeks later. The family soon settled in Milan. Neither parent was religious; his mother said his persistent questions brought her back to the faith, and a Polish babysitter answered many of them. He received First Communion at seven, became a parish catechist at 12, and in 2006 told his family he hoped to become a priest.
Computers were his other passion. He taught himself programming and web design, made a site for his parish, Santa Maria Segreta, and won a national volunteering competition for another. From 2004 he spent two and a half years building a website listing reported Eucharistic miracles worldwide and Church-recognised Marian apparitions. It went live on 4 October 2006. He also talked about faith with the family's Hindu employee from Mauritius, Rajesh Mohur, who asked to be baptised, as did Mohur's mother and a friend.
Around 1 October 2006 he developed a sore throat that doctors first put down to parotitis. Within a week he was diagnosed with acute promyelocytic leukaemia and transferred to a specialist hospital north of Milan. He offered his suffering for Pope Benedict XVI and the Church, and died on 12 October 2006 after a brain haemorrhage. His relics are now displayed in Assisi, and exhibitions based on his miracle research have toured the world.
Beatification followed in 2020 after the Church accepted a 2013 healing in Campo Grande, and a second Italian miracle in 2024 cleared the way to sainthood on 7 September 2025, alongside Pier Giorgio Frassati. Not everyone is convinced. A Catholic Review commentator noted his life held few extraordinary deeds, childhood friends told The Economist he was kind but not especially pious, and some questioned whether family money sped the process, which his postulator denied.
Source: Carlo Acutis
