Pope Leo XIV's rich multicultural heritage includes a remarkable ancestral bond with Canada's oldest Marian shrine: the miraculous Our Lady of the Cape in Trois-Rivières, Que.

Dennis Girard, the Ottawa-based co-founder and director of the Marian Devotional Movement (MDM), recalled how the pontiff’s ancestry can be traced back to France. Considering the Shrine’s historical heritage also originates from French Catholic settlers, a connection was too tantalizing a possibility to ignore.

Girard traced Robert Francis Prevost’s genealogy and found that the 266th successor of St. Peter descends from Pierre Boucher (1622-1717), a former governor of Trois-Rivières and builder of the area’s first wooden chapel in 1659. The chapel's beams were later integrated into Canada’s National Marian Shrine in Cap-de-la-Madeleine (amalgamated into Trois-Rivières in 2002), the home of Our Lady of the Cape.

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These investigative efforts revealed one more special surprise: Girard found he is a distant relative of Pope Leo.

“What's interesting is I share the same lineage going back to the Boucher family, specifically Gaspard Boucher, who came to the Cape,” said Girard.

Gaspard Boucher (1599-1662), born in the French commune of Mortagne-au-Perche, and his wife Nicole Lemaire (1595-1652) sailed to New France in 1634 or 1635 with five of their children: Pierre, Nicolas, Marie, Marguerite and Madeleine.

Within just a couple of years of his arrival in this new world, Pierre, Pope Leo’s direct ancestor, would begin four years of service at age 15 to the Jesuits in their missionary work with the Huron near modern-day Midland, Ont. He returned to Quebec from the Georgian Bay area after being injured during a 1640 Huron uprising. Pierre worked as a soldier, agent and interpreter on behalf of New France Governor Charles Huault de Montmagny. His familiarity with the Huron language made him particularly valuable. He ascended to the governorship of Trois-Rivières at age 32 and would serve two terms (1654-1658, 1662-1667).

Reflecting upon the grander significance of this discovery, Girard credited the providence of Mary.

“I think it's amazing that we have our Holy Father descending from an ancestry that built a chapel that now is Queen of the Holy Rosary,” said Girard. “Obviously, he could have descended from any family anywhere on this planet, but no, this particular shrine and the story of the Rosary and the confraternity are so important to what Our Lady is doing right now. It was just a beautiful affirmation and another indication there's something beyond us that's orchestrating things.”

Bishop Pierre-Olivier Tremblay of the Hearst-Moosonee diocese in northern Ontario is also cherishing the Pope’s link to the Notre-Dame-du-Cap (Our Lady of the Cape) Basilica. He once served as rector for this religious landmark that attracts over 400,000 pilgrims each year.

“I think that it gives us kind of a new spiritual connection and almost a family link to him,” said Tremblay. “I think it's good news for us and we can, of course, in a much-renewed manner, keep him in our prayers.”

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There is an effort underway to inform Pope Leo about his connection to Our Lady of the Cape.

Bishop Mikel Garciandía and Fernando Moscardo, the 23-year-old coordinator of the Rome '25-the Way of St. James '27-Jerusalem '33 evangelization project to reawaken Europe’s Christian identity, will meet with Girard in St. Louis over Labour Day weekend. They and many others are participating in a symposium to prepare for the Pan American Confraternity Forum (PAC27) scheduled for Sept. 2-5, 2027, at TD Place in Ottawa. This Marian Congress is one of two spiritual celebrations being held in advance of Jubilee 2033, which honours the 2,000th anniversary of Christ’s triumph over death itself.

Since Garciandía and Moscardo are collaborating with Pope Leo on the Jubilee 2033 youth initiative Journey to Redemption 2033, they could be poised to draw the pontiff’s attention to his Our Lady of the Cape linkage. Girard has already penned a letter outlining the information.

Girard said “we would just leave it up to divine Providence” in regard to his hope for an official Vatican response to this news. But he does have certain hopes.

“Certainly, one of the things in my heart that would be beautiful is if he would grant us the favour of a live stream,” said Girard. “We'll see what Our Lady has in store for us because it would be wonderful to be able to connect with him in that particular way.”

Tremblay also said it would “be very cool if he acknowledged that he has some roots here. It would be touching for all of us.”

There is no shortage of compelling stories about Our Lady of the Cape for Pope Leo to spotlight in a video. Consider the 1879 Miracle of the Ice Bridge. It appeared that unseasonably warm weather in March that year would derail Trois-Rivières' Catholics in their mission to build their new Church, as the St. Lawrence River failed to freeze. As a result, stones and other building materials could not be transported to the other side.

Fr. Luc Desilets called upon his congregation to pray for Mary’s intercession, and extraordinarily enough, planks of ice floated downstream to constitute an ice bridge solid enough to transport the items and continue construction.

The Pope could also hear the account of the Marian statue opening its eyes in the presence of Desilets, Fr. Frédéric Janssoone and a physically handicapped man named Pierre Lacroix on June 22, 1888.

“Those historical milestones took place almost a century and a half ago, but they're still so relevant for us today because we’re all called to walk in faith and sometimes in difficult situations,” said Tremblay. “But when we're all together, united in prayer, we can move mountains and we can walk on water — I’m sure of that.”

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Five years after Girard’s MDM collaborated with award-winning Canadian Catholic filmmaker Kevin Dunn on the documentary Bridge of Roses: The Story of Our Lady of the Cape, the film now includes a new frame acknowledging the papal connection. 

Find more information about Pope Leo XIV’s ancestral link to the Boucher family at ottawareligioustourism.ca/.