15-Year-Old Computer Whiz Who Died In 2006 Could Become 1st Millennial Saint

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Cardinal Agostino Vallini, left, holds a relic of 15-year-old Carlo Acutis, an Italian boy who died in 2006 of leukemia, during his beatification ceremony celebrated in the St. Francis Basilica, in Assisi, Italy, on Saturday.

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Pope Francis Announces New Path To Sainthood

«He was considered a computer genius, his mother told Vatican News. «But what did he do? He didn’t use [computers] to chat or have fun.

She told an Italian newspaper that from age from age 3 her son would ask to visit churches the family passed in Milan.

There was in him a natural predisposition for the sacred, she said.

Acutis was born in 1991 in London and moved with his parents to Milan. As a teenager, he was diagnosed with leukemia after which he offered his sufferings for then-Pope Benedict XVI and the Church, according to the Catholic News Agency. He asked to be buried at Assisi because of his love for St. Francis of Assisi.

He was canonized in 2013 and made «Venerable in 2018. With his beatification, he is designated «Blessed, according to CNA.

The next step is sainthood, which requires two miracles verified by the Church. However, the second miracles can be waived by the pope.

Acutis’ first miracle was proclaimed in 2013 when the Vatican says he interceded from heaven to save the life of a Brazilian who was suffering from a rare pancreatic disease.

Although it is rare for someone so young to become a saint, two Portuguese shepherd children living in the early 1900s who reported seeing a vision of the Virgin Mary were proclaimed saints in 2017.