PHILADELPHIA >> Pope Francis isn’t the only one bringing people of faith to Philadelphia this weekend.
One family travelled from Colchester, Ct. Thursday night to see the daughter of Saint Gianna Meretta Molla at St. Rita of Cascia church on Broad Street.
For Elizabeth Leichter, 34, and Michael Bogue, 37, Saint Gianna has had a very real impact on their lives.
“We were going through recurrent pregnancy loss. And we visited the shrine to Saint Gianna in Warminster and venerated her relics,” Leichter said. “That night we conceived.”
On her back, Leichter carried her now 2-year-old daughter, who they named Gianna.
“After we had the ultrasound that confirmed it was a girl, we had the first name picked out in about two seconds,” Bogue said.
Bogue and Leichter held hands as they spoke, telling the story of St. Gianna, the patron saint of unborn children. Gianna Meretta Molla was a pediatrician from Magenta, Italy, who had four children.
While she was pregnant with her fourth child in 1961, she underwent surgery to have a uterine tumor. She risked her life to continue with the pregnancy.
“She said, ‘That’s okay, I want my baby to live,'” Leichter said.
On April 21, 1962, her daughter, Gianna Emanuela, was born. One week later, Gianna Meretta Molla died.
On Friday, Gianna Emanuela was speaking at St. Rita of Cascia in Philadelphia, and Leichter and Bogue were eagerly anticipating seeing the daughter of their child’s namesake in person.
“I don’t know if I’ll be able to form words. I think I’ll just cry. But if I get the chance to talk to her I would thank her and thank her for her mother. I would tell her how special her mother is,” Leichter said.
Their daughter may not be old enough to understand where her name comes from, but she’ll know when she’s older. The story of Gianna and the shrine gave Leichter and Bogue hope.
“It turns out I can get pregnant really easily, but not staying pregnant,” Leichter said. “In three months, we went through two miscarriages and it was devastating.”
The parents credit their faith and their love of Saint Gianna for the greatest moment of their lives, when their daughter was born.
“I just held her, we looked at each other, and I just thought, ‘You’re mine,'” Leichter said. “I don’t think either of us stopped smiling for three months. We’d be exhausted, that way new parents are, and we’d just think this is such a wonderful problem to have.”
The family of three arrived in Philadelphia Thursday night, and plans on staying through the weekend. They have tickets to see the Papal mass on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway on Sunday.
“It’s indescribable to know we’re going to be standing in his presence,” Leichter said.
The parents were enjoying their time in Philadelphia before heading home to Connecticut, where they have taken up the cause of helping other parents bring children into the world.
“We’re working to become certified in birthing instruction,” Bogue said.
As long as they live, though, Leichter and Bogue said they will remember the day they were in the church with the daughter of their own, personal patron saint.
“She’ll always know,” Leichter said. “We’ll always tell her about how Saint Gianna brought her to us.”
