The Brief, Servant’s Life of Newly Sainted Pier Giorgio Frassati

On Sept. 7, 2025, 80,000 worshippers gathered in Saint Peter’s Square for Pope Leo XIV’s first two canonizations: Carlo Acutis and Pier Giorgio Frassati. During his homely, the pope addressed especially the young people, presenting the lives of these new saints—however brief—as guides for holiness.

He said of Frassati, “Pier Giorgio’s life is a beacon for lay spirituality. For him, faith was not a private devotion, but it was driven by the power of the Gospel and his membership in ecclesial associations. He was also generously committed to society, contributed to political life and devoted himself ardently to the service of the poor.”

Pier Giorgio Frassati was born April 6, 1901, in Turin to a rich bourgeois family. His father, Alfredo, was a lawyer and ambassador, as well as founder and director of the newspaper “La Stampa.” His mother, Adelaide Ametis, was a passionate and successful painter. Both parents were agnostic.

Yet, little Pier Giorgio was struck by the stories of the Gospel, sometimes in such a profound way that he reacted in unexpected ways for such a small child.

The Frassatis were one of the city’s most prominent families, but the young boy preferred to be the “porter” of the poor, dragging the carts loaded with household goods of the evicted through the streets of Turin.

Pier Giorgio continued assisting the needy, becoming known for giving whatever he had to the poor. The Catholic News Agency reports how he “would even use his bus fare for charity and then run home to be on time for meals.”

His sister Luciana, younger by a year, was an inseparable companion in games and study. Pier Giorgio attended the “Massimo d’Azeglio” high school and the “social institute” run by the Jesuit Fathers. Here he began the practice of daily Communion which he maintained throughout his life.

In 1918 Pier Giorgio enrolled at the Polytechnic of Turin, studying mechanical engineering with a mining specialization to “serve Christ among the miners.” He was part of the “Militates Mariae” of the Catholic Action of the parish of Crocetta and was also enrolled in religious associations, including the Apostolate of Prayer, an association of young nocturnal worshippers, and the Marian Congregation.

During a stay in Germany, Giorgio devoted himself to visiting museums, mining facilities, youth clubs and Catholic works of assistance to the poor, confirming his lay vocation.

As a member of the Conference of St. Vincent he visited the most needy families to bring them comfort and material help. He usually went there in the morning, before classes at the university, or during evening outings, loaded with packages.

In May of 1922, in the Turin church of San Domenico, he received the habit of a Dominican tertiary. As such, he recited the rosary every day, which he always carried in his breast pocket, not hesitating to take it out at any time to pray, on the tram or on the train, even on the street. “My will,” he said, showing the rosary, “I always carry it in my pocket.”

Dynamic, strong-willed, full of life, Giorgio loved mountain climbing. He often walked to the Sanctuary of the Madonna di Oropa in the Alpine town of Biella, Italy. Arriving at the sanctuary, after an hour of walking and complete fasting, he would attend Mass and Communion. On his way back home, he recited the rosary along the street, loudly singing the litanies.

During his final mountain climb, he wrote a simple note on a photograph: “Verso L’Alto”—“To the Heights.”

This would be his motto. A way of life.

On June 30, 1925, Pier Giorgio acquired a strange illness, suddenly suffering migraines and lack of appetite. It was not a trivial flu, but a fulminant poliomyelitis, a form of polio. The disease killed him in just four days, on July 4, amid the bewilderment and pain of his family and many friends and acquaintances. He was only 24 years old.

Pier Giorgio was born into the life of Heaven on Saturday, a Marian day, just as he had come into the world on Saturday, Holy Saturday, 24 years earlier.

On May 20, 1990, he was beatified in Saint Peter’s Square by Saint John Paul II. That day, as my duty, I was the honor guard nearest the altar. Next to me was a cardinal in a wheelchair. For that reason, the cameras would often zoom on him and consequently on me. My parents, my relatives, and many of my friends, saw me on TV that day and they made sure to let me know.

From my post I heard John Paul call Pier Giorgio a “joyful apostle of Christ.” He proclaimed by his example that it is worth sacrificing everything to serve the Lord. His life testified that holiness is possible for everyone and that only the revolution of charity can ignite in the hearts of men the hope of a better future.

John Paul proposed him as a “heroic model of Christian perfection” and Sunday, Sept. 7, 2025, Pope Leo XIV, while elevating him to the glory of sainthood, reminded us of that.

At a superficial glance, Saint Pier Giorgio Frassati’s existence did not present anything extraordinary. But it is precisely this fact that is the originality of his virtue, which invites reflection and pushes to imitation. In him, faith and daily events blended harmoniously, so much that the adherence to the Gospel translated into loving attention to the poor and the needy, in a continuous growth until his last days. Nothing prevented him from having a constant relationship with our Lord.

His earthly day was all immersed in the mystery of God and dedicated to the constant service of others. Pier Giorgio was a lay Christian, whose vocation was manifested in multiple associative and political commitments, in a society in turmoil, indifferent and sometimes hostile to the Church.

He lived with joy and pride, where he committed himself to love Jesus and to see in the Lord the brothers he met and which he sought in places of suffering, marginalization and abandonment, making them feel the warmth of his solidarity and the comfort of faith.

Today Pier Giorgio demonstrates that the secret of holiness, the universal vocation of the baptized, is truly within everyone’s reach because when the heart is filled with God, faith is translated into the generous service of others.

May Saint Pier Giorgio Frassati be a master to follow!

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