Among the estimated crowd of over 70,000 who gathered in Saint Peter’s Square in Rome this past Sunday for the joint canonization of Saints Pier Giorgio Frassati (1901 – 1925) and Carlo Acutis (1991 – 2006) were, at least, six pilgrims from the Diocese of Lansing.
They were seminarians Joseph Kelly, Thomas Crowley, Matthew Wilson, pictured above, and Deacon Jacob Derry, pictured below, who are all students at Rome’s Pontifical North American College, along with fellow seminarian Glen Hart of Saint John Vianney College Seminary, Minnesota, also pictured below, who is studying in Rome for a semester. Meanwhile concelebrating Holy Mass with Pope Leo XIV was Father David Fons, pictured below, formerly pastor of Saint Mary in Williamston and now an official at the Vatican’s Dicastery for Clergy. Deacon Derry also assisted at the Mass.
So why did they – and tens of thousands of others – feel the need to be there? Thomas Crowley, who hails from the Church of the Resurrection parish in Lansing, believes that answer to that question is: “hope”. Thomas writes:
In the Gospel this past Sunday Jesus tells us, “Anyone of you who does not renounce all his possessions cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:33). This is not an easy saying. Yet, Saints Pier Giorgio and Carlo lived exactly this! They, in the short time they had on earth, put Christ above all else in their lives. They lived this intense call to discipleship. Not only this, but they lived it with great joy, revealing that giving everything for Jesus does not leave us with less but rather more because we receive Him Who is everything!
So, I and the people in the square this past Sunday experienced great hope because in these two young men we were given two new concrete examples by the Church that giving Jesus everything and letting Him be our everything is actually possible and is the most fulfilling life! Let us then take heart and hold onto the hope offered to us through the example of these men: that we too, by the help of God, can ascend the heights of sanctity and live a life fully alive, fully offered to Christ, that will extend into eternal glory enjoyed with Him.
Saint Pier Giorgio Frassati, pray for us!
Saints Carlo Acutis, pray for us!
