When Bishop Charles Caruana made his “Ad Limina” visit to Rome in 2002 he took with him a large pilgrimage of people. Furthermore, they carried with them the ancient Statue of Our Lady of Europe for the pre-arranged blessing and crowning by the Holy Father, Pope John Paul II. Since the Holy Father could not visit the Shrine here the people felt it proper that the Statue be taken across to him. The Italian “L'Osservatore Romano” and the Vatican Television (CTV) were informed of the event.  At a precise moment of the General Audience the Statue was brought to the Holy Father who, after blessing the statue, immediately crowned Our Lady and the Bambino. What was quite unexpected and significant was that the Holy Father should have placed a beautiful white rosary on our lady when only a few days earlier he had declared the beginning of the Marian Year.

Both the L'Osservatore Romano showed a front page photograph and the CTV gave the event a most satisfactory coverage. The pilgrims donated a replica statue of Our Lady of Europe to the Holy Father and today it is located in the Casa Romana del Clero in Via Scroffa.