Carlo Acutis, who died aged 15, learned computer code to build websites to spread his faith

International News via Reuters:

A British-born Italian boy who died of leukaemia in 2006 will become the first Catholic saint of the millennial generation on Sunday, in a ceremony led by Pope Leo in St. Peter’s Square that is expected to attract tens of thousands of worshippers.

Carlo Acutis, who died aged 15, learned computer code to build websites to spread his faith. His story has drawn wide attention from Catholic youth, and he will now be elevated to the same level as Mother Teresa and Francis of Assisi.

Sunday’s ceremony was originally set for April but was postponed after the death of Pope Francis. Leo, elected in May to replace Francis, will now preside at such an event for the first time.

Leo will also canonize Pier Giorgio Frassati, a young Italian man who was known for helping those in need and died of polio in the 1920s.

Acutis’ mother, Antonia Salzano, told Reuters earlier this year that the heart of her son’s appeal to Catholic youth was that he lived the same life as others who were teenagers in the 2000s.

“Carlo was an ordinary child like (others). He used to play, to have friends, and to go to school. But his extraordinary quality was the fact that he opened the door of his heart to Jesus and put Jesus in the first place in his life.”

“He used this skill to spread the good news, the Gospel,” she added. “He wanted to help people to have more faith, to understand that there is an afterlife, that we are (pilgrims) in this world.”

Being made a saint means the Church believes a person lived a holy life and is now in Heaven with God.

Other saints who died at a young age include Therese of Lisieux, who died at 24 in 1897 and was known for promoting a “Little Way” of charity; and Aloysius Gonzaga who died at 23 in 1591 after caring for victims of an epidemic in Rome.

As Acutis progressed along the Church’s official path to sainthood, his body was moved to a church in the hill town of Assisi in central Italy, where St. Francis was from, in line with Acutis’ last wishes.

The new saint’s final resting place, where Acutis is entombed with a wax mould of his likeness placed over his body, wearing his track top, jeans and trainers, has become a popular devotional site, attracting thousands of worshippers every day.

Reporting by Joshua McElweeEditing by Gareth Jones

Thirty-eight people were involved in the accident, with 15 killed at the scene while two more died in hospital overnight

International News via Reuters:

Flags flew at half-mast in Lisbon on Thursday after at least 17 people were killed and 21 injured in a crash of a hillside funicular railway popular with tourists, while Portuguese authorities began investigating the cause of the accident.

The city’s remaining two lines were shut for inspections, authorities said.

Footage from the site showed the mangled wreckage of the yellow tram-like funicular, which carries people up and down a steep hillside in the Portuguese capital, lying where it had left the track and hit a building, just metres from another car at the bottom of the hill.

Eliane Chaves, a Brazilian who has lived in Lisbon for 20 years, said she walked past the funicular every day.

“It is truly sad,” she said, as tears streamed down her cheeks. “People say that it was negligence but it was not negligence. They supervise it thoroughly. It was an accident, just like a plane or car accident can happen.”

Manuel Leal, leader of the Fectrans union, told local TV that workers on the Gloria railway – one of the symbols of the city – had complained about problems with the funicular’s haulage cable tension that made braking difficult, but it was too early to say if that was the cause of the crash.The municipal public transport company Carris said in a statement that “all maintenance protocols have been carried out”, including monthly and weekly maintenance programmes and daily inspections.

Thirty-eight people were involved in the accident, with 15 killed at the scene while two more died in hospital overnight, said Margarida Martins, head of the city’s emergency services.

The injured included four Portuguese, two Germans, two Spanish, one Korean, one Cape Verdean, one Canadian, one Italian, one French, one Swiss and one Moroccan, she said.

The German foreign ministry said in a statement that it assumed some of its citizens were among the victims.

CABLE SNAPPED

At the scene of the crash police could be seen taking photos of the wreckage as well as inspecting the braking system on the undamaged car nearby.

The line’s two cars, each capable of carrying around 40 people, are attached to opposite ends of a haulage cable with traction provided by electric motors on the cars that counterbalance each other.

As the cable apparently snapped, the car that was coming down the 265-metre slope lost its ability to brake and derailed on a turn, crashing into a corner building.

The car at the bottom of the line jolted back a couple of metres (yards) and was apparently undamaged, but video from bystanders showed several passengers jumping out of its windows.

The line, which opened in 1885, connects Lisbon’s downtown area near the Restauradores Square with the Bairro Alto, or Upper Quarter, famous for its vibrant nightlife.

The Gloria line transports around 3 million people annually, according to the town hall.

Authorities did not identify the victims or disclose their nationalities, but said some foreign nationals were among the dead.

Some local media reported that a German family-of-three was among the victims, including a three-year-old child who suffered minor injuries, while the father died and the mother was seriously hurt.

Portugal, and Lisbon in particular, has experienced a tourism boom in the past decade, with visitors cramming the popular downtown area in the summer months.

Reporting by Andrei Khalip, Inti Landauro, Sergio Goncalves; Writing by Charlie Devereux; Editing by Alex Richardson