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What kind of person comes to mind when you think of the qualities that Jesus highlighted in the Beatitudes? “Blessed
are the poor in spirit . . . they who mourn . . . the meek . . . the clean of heart . . .” (see Matthew 5:3-11).
Perhaps not many people would come up with a description that fits Pier Giorgio Frassati—wealthy, fun-loving, and handsome.
But when Pope John Paul II beatified this young Italian in 1990, he did not hesitate to call him “a man of the Beatitudes.”
Beneath the engaging exterior, Pier Giorgio was indeed poor in spirit and pure of heart. But he manifested these qualities
in a very balanced way. Those who knew him saw his goodness but never thought of him as otherworldly or “saintly.”
He lived a vibrant Christian life in thoroughly secular surroundings. One biographer called Pier Giorgio an “ordinary”
Christian, but if so, being an ordinary Christian means putting God first in everything and spending yourself entirely—and
joyfully—for others.
An Unhappy Family.
Pier Giorgio was born in Turin on April 6, 1901. His sister Luciana, who became his closest friend, was born seventeen months
later. His father, Alfredo, owned and edited La Stampa, an influential liberal newspaper. Adelaide, his mother, was an artist
from a wealthy family.
From childhood, Pier Giorgio experienced a tension-filled family life because his parents had drifted apart. Their arguing
and alienation from each other, which only intensified over the years, was a daily heartache for the boy.
The situation toughened his character and subtly drew him to Christ. His parents did little to encourage this, and Pier Giorgio
received his religious training almost exclusively from priests and nuns at school. Alfredo, who was an agnostic, once complained
to a priest after finding his pre-teen son asleep on the floor with a rosary in his hand. “Perhaps you would rather
have him fall asleep with a dirty novel?” the priest retorted.
Neither did Adelaide like Pier Giorgio’s religious inclinations; she worried they might lead him to the priesthood instead
of a secular career. When a Jesuit invited her twelve-year-old son to daily Mass and Communion, she strenuously refused—until
Pier Giorgio’s begging made her relent. Daily Mass then became his routine.
Joyful Giving.
At seventeen, Pier Giorgio discovered what would become the great joy of his life: He joined the St. Vincent de Paul Society
and began visiting the homes of Turin’s poor. The needs were many, for the city teemed with jobless World War I veterans
and destitute working families. As Pier Giorgio met these people, he fell in love with them.
Bringing them food, clothing, and money became his daily passion. In a typical week, his acts of kindness looked something
like this:
Sunday, shoes for a barefoot child
Monday, a room for a homeless woman
Tuesday, boots for an unemployed laborer
Wednesday, payment of a girl’s school bill
Thursday, relocation for a blind veteran
Friday, groceries for a hungry family
Saturday, medicine for an old man with bronchitis.
Pier Giorgio impoverished himself in order to give as much as possible. Frequently, he had to run home from the slums because
he had given a beggar his money for the train. When a friend asked why he traveled uncomfortably in third class, he said,
“Because there’s not a fourth class.”
One frigid evening, he came home without his overcoat, which he had given to an elderly homeless man. Alfredo was furious,
but his son’s simple answer disarmed him: “But you see, Dad, it was cold.” When given the choice of a car
or its value in cash as a graduation present, Pier Giorgio took the money and spent it on the needy.
He enjoyed his relationships with those he served and liked to deliver their gifts in person. He saw it as a chance to “encourage
the people a bit, give them hope that their lives will change.” He also liked to use the opportunity to speak about
God and encourage them to meet Jesus at Mass.
”Going to Christ.”
Pier Giorgio’s charitable missions took him into hovels that were a stark contrast to his family’s upper-class
homes. When a friend asked why he wasn’t repulsed by the filth, he replied: “Jesus comes to me every morning in
Holy Communion. I repay him in my very small way by visiting the poor. The house may be sordid, but I am going to Christ.”
With these few words, Pier Giorgio revealed the heart of his spirituality. His joy, which sustained him in every sorrow, flowed
from his intimacy with Jesus.
He nourished this intimacy through daily Mass and frequent prayer before the Blessed Sacrament. “After a prayer vigil,”
he said, “I feel stronger, safer, more secure, and even happier.”
He loved Scripture, too, especially the letters of St. Paul. On his desk he posted 1 Corinthians 13; Paul’s magnificent
hymn to love was his reminder of the right motive for acts of kindness. He regularly read The Imitation of Christ and included
it in his gift packages to poor families, along with the New Testament.
With all of this went a lively devotion to Mary. Pier Giorgio always had a rosary at hand and prayed it several times a day,
often with his friends. He tacked on his bedroom door St. Bernard’s prayer to the Virgin from Dante’s Paradiso.
When at his mother’s summer villa, he made daily pilgrimages to a Marian shrine five miles away.
Politics as an Act of Faith.
Pier Giorgio saw the need for social change that would relieve the causes of poverty. He decided to major in mechanical engineering
so that he could work with miners, who were especially disadvantaged.
At the university, he was a leader in student political organizations and joined Italy’s Popular Party. He had a vision
of uniting professionals with workers in order to form a team that could improve conditions for the lower classes.
The rise of Fascism in the early 1920s distressed Pier Giorgio deeply. At great personal risk, he worked with opposition parties,
marched in anti-Fascist demonstrations, and publicly denounced Mussolini and his party. He could hardly control his rage when
Mussolini came to power in October 1922 with the limited support of the Popular Party. “I glanced at Mussolini’s
speech,” he wrote, “and my blood boiled. I am disappointed by the really shameful behavior of the Popular Party.”
For Pier Giorgio, involvement in politics and social reform was an act of faith. Every morning when the priest concluded Mass,
saying, “Ite, missa est!” (“Go, you are sent!”), he accepted it as the Lord’s charge to work
for justice. For Pier Giorgio, said Luciana, “living in society meant struggling for the Spirit to return, reactivating
it where it was feeble and kindling it where it did not exist.”
Fun for Christ.
Though it all, Pier Giorgio valued fun and friendship. In the last year of his short life, he was especially enjoying the
activities of the “Shady Character’s Society,” a group of young men and women who were his closest friends.
Pier Giorgio was the group’s officially designated “practical joker” and the instigator of many jokes, hoaxes,
and pranks.
The society gathered for climbing expeditions, which he planned and directed. On mountain tops he led his friends in prayer,
celebrating the One who created the majestic peaks. Afterwards, they relaxed and enjoyed food, wine, cigars, and songs, which
Pier Giorgio bellowed out in his deep voice. He knew he was always off-key, but protested that “the important thing
is to sing.”
Beneath the light-hearted fun, however, deep sorrows were roiling in the young man’s heart. He had fallen in love with
Laura Hidalgo, one of the young women in the group, and wanted to marry her. He revealed this only to his sister, for he knew
their parents wanted him to marry someone of higher social status. Alfredo and Adelaide were on the verge of officially separating,
and Pier Giorgio feared that a decision to marry Laura would cause his parents to end their marriage. He could not bring himself
to destroy one family by starting another. So he quietly bore the pain of saying no to his undeclared love.
Then in 1925, when Pier Giorgio was about to graduate and begin working with miners, Alfredo sabotaged his dream. He decided
that his son should be trained to become the manager of La Stampa. Reluctant to break the news himself, he asked a business
associate to communicate it. Although dumbfounded and profoundly disappointed, Pier Giorgio acquiesced. “Do you think
this will please my Dad?” he asked the messenger, who nodded yes. “Then tell him I accept.”
Down with Gloom!
Before he could begin this new work, however, Pier Giorgio became very ill. No one in the Frassati household paid much attention.
They were preoccupied with his grandmother, who was dying, and they thought his sickness would pass quickly. But Pier Giorgio
had contracted polio—probably during one of his visits to the poor—and by the time his family realized how ill
he was, it was too late. When he was unable to attend his grandmother’s funeral, Adelaide even unwittingly complained
that he was never available when needed.
To the end, the poor were first in Pier Giorgio’s thoughts. While on his deathbed, he asked Luciana to deliver medicine
to a sick person and to renew an insurance policy for a poor man on his behalf. They were his last works of mercy. He died
on July 4, 1925.
The sudden death left everyone in shock. And when thousands of Turin’s poor came to the funeral, Alfredo and Adelaide
were astounded at the tribute to their son’s generosity and service.
One of my favorite photographs of Pier Giorgio shows him descending an Alpine mountain, smiling with a pipe in his mouth.
Another of my favorites has him and several buddies cheerfully dragging a barrel of wine to a party. But I also carry in my
memory the testimony of his friend who reported that when Pier Giorgio left a church after an hour of prayer, he would turn
and give a little wave toward the tabernacle.
That affectionate gesture, so emblematic of his closeness to Jesus, expresses something of the joy and naturalness with which
Pier Giorgio lived the “ordinary” Christian life in the heart of the world. And I reflect on his words: “Each
day I understand a little better the incomparable grace of being a Catholic. Down, then, with all melancholy!. . . I am joyful.
Sorrow is not gloom. Gloom should be banished from the Christian soul.”
For a more complete account of Pier Giorgio Frassati’s life, as well as stories of nine other holy men and women, see
Bert Ghezzi’s book, The Heart of a Saint: Ten Ways to Draw Closer to God.
© Copyright 2009 by Bert Ghezzi
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