‘Don’t be fooled by worldly illusions’

Catholic artist uses magic show to teach faith

Giancarlo Bernini performs a magic trick with the help of a volunteer on Friday, March 7, at the 2025 Idaho Catholic Youth Convention at the Ford Idaho Center adjunct sports arena in Nampa. (ICR Photo/Joe Egbert)

By Deacon Scott Pearhill

ICR Editor

“¿Quién eres tú?” Who are you? 

Giancarlo Bernini’s grandfather taught him many things about life by posing riddles and asking simple questions. After several failed attempts at an answer, Bernini, only seven years old, replied, “I don’t know. You tell me.” His grandfather said, “If you don’t know, how would I?”

That simple exchange caused Giancarlo Bernini to begin considering the meaning of his life and the nature of his identity. Now he can say definitively, with authority and humility, “I am a child of God. That’s my identity.”

Bernini confessed that he had a long journey to this healthy self-knowledge. Twelve hundred youths listened with rapt attention to his keynote presentation. The 2025 Idaho Catholic Youth Convention (ICYC) at the Ford Idaho Center adjunct sports arena was filled to capacity for the March 8 event.

Bernini explained he was a social outcast at his small middle school but overcame the isolation by performing magic tricks. In seventh grade, he performed a card trick during lunch, and his classmates loved it. He quickly learned new tricks and illusions and was invited to join others at recess and during lunch. At first, his peers called him “magic-boy,” but eventually, he earned their admiration and became one of the popular middle school students.

Fast-forward 20 years. Bernini was an award-winning illusionist performing critically acclaimed, world-class magic tricks. He loved the applause, the gasps and laughs garnered from appreciative audiences. His self-esteem and sense of self-worth were high. But then COVID hit, and all his performances were canceled.

Bernini described how the loss of praise led to a loss of identity. He had so strongly identified with being a magic performer that the sudden and sustained multi-year loss of performing caused him to fall into depression.

During this time, he heard his grandfather’s question echoing in his heart again: “¿Quién eres tú?” “Who are you?” Without thinking, conquered by worldly definitions of success, he answered, “I am only a magician.” Bernini related that his being was so tied to his talents that he forgot he was a child of God.

During this time, he fell into bad habits and disclosed that he hurt a long-time friend with his angry words. But another friend encouraged him to go to Confession.

He hadn’t been in a long while.

During the period of his success, he practiced his faith less and less, and during COVID, he stopped going to church altogether. A friend suggested he go to Confession, which felt like an impossible proposition. Not only did he feel ashamed of his behavior, he felt like a hypocrite. How could he present himself before God after drifting so far from Him? His friend, however, reminded him of God’s superabundant love and mercy.

Bernini went to Confession.

He rediscovered that he was a child of God and that his Father in heaven would never want him to be alone and bereft of His love. His worth and esteem did not come from performing magic tricks.

He was fooled into believing worldly praise was the basis of happiness. But through the Sacrament of Reconciliation, he discovered the true source of happiness, his identity as a child of God, which was always there.

Now that the magician could see through the illusion, he realized he could use his God-given gifts to help others know the peace and power of being God’s children: the “magician” would help others see through the soul-crushing worldly illusions that lead to despair and darkness.

He noted that God created each of us to fill a gap that no one else can fill. Each of us, Bernini said, is made to share God’s light in unique places and unique ways, “and the world is worse off without our light.” He added, “When we wake up in the morning and God says, ‘Here’s what we’re doing today.’ God isn’t talking to everyone, but to you personally.”

All we need to do is accept God’s invitation, to say yes to the light of Christ.

Bernini asked the youth to imagine a church at night.

“You can’t actually see the images in the stained-glass windows unless there is light.” In the dark, the stained glass is indecipherable. “We’re all a little bit like stained glass windows. We might be a little broken here and there, and rough around the edges, but we can all shine light in very unique ways that no one else can. The only way others can see the images on the stained glass is when the light shines through it.”

Bernini finished his presentation by performing one more illusion, but with the purpose of demonstrating that things aren’t always what the seem. He encouraged the youth to cherish the light of Christ that dispels all darkness and illumines each person as a source of God’s love in the world.  

Bernini concluded his performance by demonstrating things aren’t always what the seem. (ICR Photo/Deacon Scott Pearhill)