An unforgettable spiritual encounter unfolded for a North Bay area family when their 11-month-old son, David Van Milligen, was personally blessed by Pope Leo XIV during a parish pilgrimage to Rome.
It happened during a Holy Name of Jesus parish trip this past week, as one of the youngest parishioners, 11-month-old David Van Milligen, was swooped up by the Pope's security guards and blessed by Pope Leo himself. Every Wednesday, the Pope holds a general audience where he speaks on a topic, and before it starts, he makes a little drive around part of the square.
Mom Theresa Marie, a nurse practitioner, told BayToday it was a life-changing experience.
"It was so lovely. It was so personal. Before the Pope touched David, he got down, and he made eye contact, because David was kind of looking around and was like, 'What's happening?' And so he made sure he had David's attention, then he took his hand, and then he blessed his head. And then he looked up and found my husband, Mat, and me, and gave us a nod. And it felt really personal, like we actually got to meet him, even though we said nothing to each other, and we were still 10 feet away. And then they passed David back, and the Pope went on his way, and we just... basically vibrated with excitement. We were so excited and delighted."
It almost didn't happen, and the odds were long, but everything fell in place for the Chisholm couple.
They were travelling with a group of 40, and got up at 6 a.m. to be sure to get a spot for the 9:40 event, which sees the Pope in his Popemobile greet the thousands in attendance at St. Peter's Square. They knew they would have to get there early to have any chance of getting a close-up view of the Supreme Pontiff.
The group headed out to find a spot near the barricade because that's where your best chance is to see the Pope going by, but despite the early effort, all of the seats were already taken. There was nowhere to sit next to the barricade.
That's where the story takes a twist. The couple noticed an open area where no one was standing.
"So we're standing there with the baby, and we're just waiting, then these two men that were sitting right beside us happened to have two extra seats, and they gave them to us. They just said, 'You guys can have these seats if you want.' It felt like such a blessing."
And so the Van Milligens sat down. Immediately, another family came to stand where they had just been standing, and a guard came and said, 'You can't stand here. You have to go sit down.'
"So if those two men hadn't given us their seats, we wouldn't have been able to see the Pope," said Theresa Marie. "It was just so lovely."
The family then waited patiently for a couple of hours, letting baby David crawl around on the ground.
"Everybody around us was really excited. They were like, 'Do you think you'll get blessed?' And we were like, 'I don't know, maybe, we hope so.'"
As it turned out, the two men who had given them their seats were actually tour guides, coming every week with a different group.
"So they said, 'Your best chance of getting him blessed is if you hang over the side, hang the baby over. Hold him up like Simba in The Lion King.' I'm so glad they said that to us, because I wouldn't have done that. It would have seemed too forward. I would have just held him and hoped. But I did it."
As soon as Pope Leo came out, everybody was on their feet, pressing against the barricades.
"We can see him getting closer and closer, and we're leaning over the side of the barricade, and we had to stand our ground because we would have been edged out because there were so many people. And then when he got close enough, I just leaned over and held David up like Simba and the Lion King.
"The vehicle's getting closer and closer, and then one guard walks by me, another guard walks by, and the third guard walks by, and I think, 'Oh, it's not going to happen.' And the fourth guard made eye contact with me, and I could see it in his face. He was like, 'I see how much you want this,' then he scooped David up and lifted him to the Pope."
Husband Mat says he is very surprised at how personal the whole experience felt.
"I wasn't really expecting that. I wasn't really expecting it to happen in the first place, but if it happened, it would just be kind of formulaic, like he would just bless babies and then be on his way. But then he made a point to make eye contact with us, and that directness was surprising. We felt incredibly blessed by that as well.
"It was pretty emotional, and I'm not a very emotional person, but yes, when he actually made eye contact with us, it caught my breath, and that's not a common experience for me at all."
That excitement has spread to others as well. Theresa Marie says the group, led by Fr. Daniele Muscolino, was overjoyed by the whole experience.
"People are so excited. They're treating him like a little mini celebrity since he got blessed by the Pope. We got on a plane, and two of the ladies we travel with, I'm pretty sure they told the entire 787, they told everyone. The stewardesses were coming over and asking us, 'Is this the baby that got blessed by the Pope?' It's been a real treat; people have been really lovely about it."
Fr. Daniele Muscolino, the Pastor at Holy Name of Jesus, described the experience as "kind of surreal."
"There's the Pope, and he's just so joyful looking. Usually, when I see the Pope, it's in big crowds of young people. When I take young people on pilgrimages, there are millions of people. This time, smaller crowds. There were still 40,000 people there, but that's a small crowd, and the Pope actually stopped and he was talking to us, he was looking at Theresa Marie, and we shared this moment, it was really surreal, it was really cool."
And yes, in case you are wondering, David is named after the king of Israel who defeated the giant Goliath. The baby's middle name is John Paul after Pope John Paul II. He is one of six Van Milligen children.
For the Van Milligens, "It was definitely the highlight of our entire trip."