patron

Pier Giorgio Frassati (Our Patron)

Young people today who are looking for a role model will find someone to identify with in this
vibrant young outdoorsman who combined a deep love for Christ, a desire to serve the
needy, and a mission to imbue society and politics with Christian ideals.

Pier Giorgio Frassati was born in Turin, Italy on Holy Saturday, April 6, 1901. His father, an
agnostic, was the founder and director of the liberal newspaper, La Stampa, and was
influential in Italian politics, serving a term as senator, and later was Italy's ambassador to
Germany. He spent the flower of his youth between two world wars when Italy was in social
ferment and Fascism was on the rise.

Pier Giorgio developed a deep spiritual life which he never hesitated to share with his friends.
In 1918 he joined the St. Vincent de Paul Society and dedicated much of his spare time to
serving the sick and the needy. He decided to become a mining engineer so he could "serve
Christ better among the miners," as he told a friend. His studies, however, did not keep him
from social activism.

“To live without faith, without a patrimony to defend, without a steady struggle for truth, that
is not living, but existing.”
In 1919, he joined the Catholic Student Federation and the Popular Party, a political
organization which promoted the Catholic Church's teachings. He even entertained the idea
of merging the Catholic Student Federation with the Catholic Workers' Organization.

"Charity is not enough: we need social reform," he used to say, as he worked for both. He
also gave his time to help establish a Catholic daily newspaper Momento which was based
on the principles of Pope St. Leo XIII's encyclical on social and economic matters, Rerum
Novarum.

Although the Frassati family was well-to-do, the father was frugal and never gave his two
children much spending money. What little he did have, however, Pier Giorgio gave to help
the poor, even using his train fare for charity and then running home to be on time for meals
in a house where punctuality and frugality were the law. When asked by friends why he often
rode third class on the trains he would reply with a smile, "Because there is not a fourth
class."

When he was a child a poor mother with a boy in tow came begging to the Frassati home.
Pier Giorgio answered the door, and seeing the boy's shoeless feet gave him his own shoes.
At graduation, given the choice by his father of money or a car he chose the money and gave
it to the poor. He obtained a room for a poor old woman evicted from her tenement, provided
a bed for a consumptive invalid, supported three children of a sick and grieving widow. He
kept a small ledger book containing detailed accounts of his transactions, and while he lay
on his death bed, he gave instructions to his sister, asking her to see to the needs of families
who depended on his charity. He even took the time, with a near-paralyzed hand, to write a
note to a friend in the St. Vincent de Paul Society with instructions regarding their weekly
Friday visits. Only God knew of these charities; he never mentioned them to others.

At the Italian embassy in Berlin, he was admired by a German news reporter who wrote: "One
night in Berlin, with the temperature at twelve degrees below zero, he gave his overcoat to a
poor old man shivering with cold. His father scolded him, and he replied simply and matter-of-
factly: 'But you see, papa, it was cold.'"

Pier Giorgio also spent time in the countryside with friends; mountain climbing was one of
his favorite sports. On these outings, however, the young friends (who, in a bit of irony,
called themselves "The Sinister Ones") did not hesitate to share their religious inspiration
and spiritual lives. Beneath the smiling exterior of the restless university student was
concealed the amazing life of a mystic. Love for Jesus motivated his actions. He assisted at
Mass and communion daily, often serving Mass and making a lengthy thanksgiving
afterwards.

He felt a strong, mysterious urge to be near the Blessed Sacrament. During nocturnal
adoration, he would spend all night on his knees in profound prayer. He influenced other
students to make the annual university retreat given by the Jesuits. He loved the rosary, a
family practice, and prayed it three times daily after becoming a Dominican tertiary.

He made it a regular habit upon returning from skiing to visit the Blessed Sacrament, and
attending Mass before going to the mountains. He wrote to a friend, "I left my heart on the
mountain peaks and I hope to retrieve it this summer when I climb Mt. Blanc. If my studies
permitted, I would spend whole days on the mountains admiring in that pure atmosphere the
magnificence of God."

Frassati was also imbued with the refinement of higher education and the upper class
Turinese milieu. He frequented opera, theaters, and museums; he loved art and music and
could quote whole chunks of Dante.

In 1922 he joined the Dominican Third Order choosing the name Girolamo after his personal
hero, the Dominican preacher and reformer of Florence's Renaissance. Despite the many
organizations to which Pier Giorgio belonged, he was not a passive "joiner"; records show
that he was active and involved in each, fulfilling all the duties of membership. Pier Giorgio
was strongly anti-fascist and did nothing to hide his political views.
“The faith given to me in baptism suggests to me surely: by yourself you will do nothing, but
if you have God as the center of all your action, then you will reach the goal.”

“One ought to go and one goes. It is not those who suffer violence that should fear, but those
who practice it. When God is with us, we do not need to be afraid.”
Participating in a Church-organized demonstration in Rome, he withstood police violence
and rallied the other young people by grabbing the banner which the police had knocked out
of someone else's hands. He held it even higher while using the pole to ward off their blows.
When the demonstrators were arrested by the police, he refused special treatment that he
might have received because of his father's political position, preferring to stay with his
friends. One night a group of fascists broke into his family's home to attack him and his
father. Pier Giorgio beat them off single-handedly chasing them down the street calling them,
"Blackguards! Cowards!"

In late June 1925 Pier Giorgio was afflicted by an acute attack of poliomyelitis which doctors
later speculated he caught from the poor and sick whom he tended. Neglecting his own
health because his grandmother was dying, his illness was too advanced for anyone to treat
when doctors discovered how weak he was. Pier Giorgio died on July 4, 1925, at the age of
24.

His family expected Turin's elite and political figures to come to offer their condolences and
attend the funeral; they naturally expected to find many of his friends there as well. They
were surprised, however, to find the streets of the city lined with thousands of mourners as
the cortege passed by. Those who mourned his death most were the poor and needy whom
he had served so unselfishly for seven years; many of these, in turn, were surprised to learn
that the saintly young man they new only as "Fra Girolamo" came from such an influential
family. It was these poor people who petitioned the Archbishop of Turin to begin the cause
for canonization. The process was opened in 1932 and he was beatified on May 20, 1990.
Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati's feast day is July 4.