Pier Giorgio Frassati: Letters to His Friends and Family

By Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati

"So what did he do to become a saint? What miracles did he work?" These are the questions one often hears about the life of Pier Giorgio Frassati. For Catholics who associate sainthood with miracles and spiritual phenomena, the story of a young man who lived an ordinary life seems rather... well, ordinary. And at first glance, that is what it was: days that revolved around a routine of home, school and friends; weekends spent skiing in the mountains or swimming at the beach. Many of Pier Giorgio's letters and postcards are filled with the humdrum recitation of details concerning exams taken, tourist sites visited, trains missed, and even greetings to the family pets. His was a life like millions of others, even like our own; it was very ordinary.

Or was it? From the first letter written to his father at the age of five, to the last reminder to a friend scrawled with a paralyzed hand as he lay on his deathbed at the age of twenty-four, Pier Giorgio's strong faith shines forth brightly.