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On April 19, 2018 Chinelo Okolo, a junior at Benedictine Academy, shook hands with Pope Francis. Chinelo was one of eleven students from Benedictine schools around the world who participated in a program celebrating the 125th anniversary of the Benedictine San Anselmo College in Rome. In addition to a special audience with the Pope, she and her companions visited historic and sacred sites of both Roman and Benedictine significance.
Chinelo was so elated by her experience that neither jet lag nor lack of sleep kept her from arriving early at school the morning after an evening return home. In addition to the awesomeness of meeting the Pope, she also discovered that much of what she had learned in class came alive and became real to her when she was actually present to it. She found it difficult to say good bye to her companions in Rome who shared the Benedictine connection.
In describing the celebration the San Anselmo website states: “The most important event, without a doubt, will be the audience with His Holiness Pope Francis. In fact, he will meet, in the late morning of 19 April, in the Clementine Hall of the Vatican, the Abbot Primate, several abbots and abbesses of the Confederation, the residents and collaborators of the College and of Sant’Anselmo University, representatives of various branches and international institutions.” – and Chinelo was one of those representatives.
