Columbus St. Francis DeSales High School students are dedicating several spaces in its building to honor recently canonized St. Carlo Acutis and the Blessed Virgin Mary.
During Catholic Schools Week from Jan. 25 through Jan. 31, a design contest will be announced that will give students an opportunity to design artwork to be permanently placed in the graphic arts and computer classroom, which will be renamed the St. Carlo Acutis Technology Lab, and on Marian walls that pay homage to the Blessed Virgin.
Principal Dan Garrick said he anticipates that students will have several weeks to submit designs that will be judged by faculty members. The winners will likely receive a tuition grant or stipend.
“Within the space of the Carlo Acutis computer lab, we want to have a mural on one of the walls that would depict his life,” Garrick said. “And we also want to have somewhere within the room a statue of St. Carlo Acutis.
“And on the Marian walls, the same type of thing. And we’ll encourage them to be creative.”
He said there also could be a digital component to the walls with a video display to go along with the images of Mary.
The two areas of the schools under consideration for Marian walls are a hallway that leads to the campus ministry office adjacent to the chapel and in a second-floor hallway where theology classrooms are located.
After the winning designs are announced, the project likely would start before the end of the school year and then be completed in the summer.
Garrick said the contest is similar to one that was initiated during his first year as principal in 2004-05 when students designed a stained-glass window in the northwest corner of the building to pay tribute to St. Francis de Sales, the school’s patron.
“And ultimately what ended up happening is the concepts or designs of three different kids ending up being blended to come up with that is our current stained glass window, and I see this happening the same way during Catholic Schools Week.”
St. Carlo Acutis has been a focal point for students this year. Last summer’s reading assignment was a book titled Carlo Acutis, the First Millennial Saint by Nicola Gori.
In addition, this year’s senior class selected Carlos Acutis, who was canonized by Pope Leo XIV in September, as its patron saint. The tradition of each senior class selecting a patron that best personifies the interests of the students was started eight years ago.
A five-foot statue of St. Carlo will be placed in the school’s courtyard in the spring next to the previous classes’ patron saints.
St. Carlo Acutis was an Italian teenager devoted to his Catholic faith who died at age 15 in 2006.
One of his accomplishments using technology was compiling a database of Eucharistic miracles around the world.
“The fact that he’s a young millennial saint who was committed to using technology to enhance one’s relationship with Christ, we see that as a great message for the kids,” Garrick said. “And (considering) we had them read that book coming into the year in preparation for his canonization, this will be a nice extension of the time we’ve been spending learning more about him.”
The launch of the design projects for the St. Carlo Acutis Technology Lab and the Marian walls will be included in a number of activities planned for Catholic Schools Week.
“We do a lot of fun things,” Garrick said, “but we also want there to be a more significant message of our Catholic faith. We want this to be an opportunity to be a meaningful reflection … to really pay homage to our Blessed Mother and to further make the connection that sainthood is not limited to those who are older but that we can all aspire to sainthood, even as young people.”