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That’s probably a headline I could never have imagined writing but proceedings are gathering steam for the canonization of Blessed Carlo Acutis, who is already being dubbed the First Millennial Saint.
Carlo Acutis died, aged 15 in 2006 from leukemia, and application to the Catholic Church for Sainthood began in 2012. In October 2020, he was beatified by the Pope, taking him one stage away from becoming a saint, a process which is expected to be completed in 2025 after last month, Pope Francis approved the final stage.
The Catholic Church says that in order to become a saint you need to have two miracles attributed to you (bear with me) and Carlo has passed this test. The first miracle is said to have occurred in 2019 when a boy suffering from leukemia prayed to Acutis and was able to resume a solid diet after being told he would be on a liquid diet.
The second miracle came in 2022 with the news that the mother of a girl who experienced a brain hemorrhage and was expected to not survive also prayed to Acutis and shortly after the girl began to breathe on her own once more.
The link with video games arises because, even back in 2006 Carlo was a keen video gamer. A fan of Halo and owner, as many kids of that time, of a PlayStation, and this fact has been taken on by religious gamers everywhere who would like to see him as the first gamer saint. It does turn out however that he only played games for an hour a week as a sort of penance and because he thought people could end up being controlled by them.
Blessed Carlo Acutis is the first person to be beatified who was born during this technological age and where others may have been awarded sainthood for getting rid of all the snakes from Ireland, or curing lepers, it seems as though gamers are about to get their own little bit of divine guidance.
There seems to be a game in development – Acutis Game – The First Catholic Open-World Metaverse and you can watch the trailer of that above, with the premise seeming to be you can control Carlo as he travels through 2,000 years of Catholic history.
You can read much more about Bl. Carlo Acustis, the person, here.
