CSF Exclusive: Interview with the St. Junipero Serra Route Pilgrims Part I

San Francisco seminarians Dereck Delgado and Jimmy Velasco share reflections from their time on the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage 

This is a first in a series of stories and reflections from the Perpetual Pilgrims on the St. Junipero Serra Route of the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage. The following is an interview with San Francisco seminarians Dereck Delgado and Jimmy Velasco.

Catholic San Francisco:
Welcome to Indianapolis! Congratulations on completing the Serra Route of the National Eucharistic Pilgrimage!

We have been praying for you and following your journey as you have traveled across the country. What was your favorite part of the pilgrimage? Was there one moment that you thought was the most powerful?

Dereck Delgado:
There’s a few moments that stand out to me, but most especially is when we arrived in Steamboat Springs, Colorado. I helped drive the van for a lot of the way. So, we needed to get gas. I dropped everybody off at the church and they were getting everything prepared for Adoration, and as I was driving to the gas station, there was this huge dump truck that was following me, which I thought was a little bit weird. 

So then, I pull into the gas station, and then a guy jumps out of the truck, this beefy trucker kind-of dude, and I was a little intimidated, thinking, “Oh no it’s road rage,” or something. And then he comes up to me and he has the biggest smile on his face. He says, “Thank you for doing this.” Just a random guy. He said, “Thank you for doing this. I saw that sign on your van. I know what it means. I don’t know what you’re doing, but I know what that means, the Eucharist, and I’m just so excited that young people like you are bringing the Eucharist to this country.”

He said he’s a lapsed Catholic. He explained his story – that there are issues with his family and all this hurt and all these wounds, but he’s just glad that we’re bringing the Eucharist to people.

That’s something Crookston Bishop Cozzens also recognized, I think, that we’re bringing the Eucharist outside the church, to the people and to others. So he tells me a story about his family. And his one prayer request for me was to pray for the conversion of his wife to come back to the faith. Somebody who doesn’t even go to Mass himself, and he’s asking for healing. He’s opening up his voice for healing and transformation.

Catholic San Francisco: 
That’s powerful. What about for you, Jimmy?

Jimmy Velasco:
I think there are many, many highlights on our trip. Obviously, we like to brag that we were on the most scenic route traveling across the west, such as bringing the Blessed Sacrament to the Rocky Mountains. Having Benediction there was really incredible. Another moment was when we were waiting for Sacramento Bishop Soto to cross Lake Tahoe with the Eucharist.

But I think what stands out to me the most was when we were in Missouri and one of the churches had never done a Eucharistic procession before. It was their very first time. So we were all scrambling trying to organize things. The pastor had no idea how to run a procession, so we were all hands on deck for that. And as we were doing the procession, preparing for it, people told us, “Look up.” Then looking up, there’s a rainbow circling around the sun in the form of the Eucharist, like a monstrance. That rainbow was with us the whole way through the Eucharistic procession. Then, as we made it to the place where we had Benediction, as soon as the Eucharist was reposed into the van, the rainbow went away. We called it the miracle of the sun. The parishioners who walked with us will never forget that day.

Catholic San Francisco:
You have touched people along the way. How has the pilgrimage touched you? How has it changed you? You came into this very spiritually prepared already because you’re at the seminary, praying every day, going to Mass, but how did this experience change you or touch you in your faith?

Delgado:
Well, at least from my own vocation I think about St. Therese’s terminology, the vocation to love and the wounded healer idea. I came into this pilgrimage, my intention was to deepen my discernment, to have a greater confidence in this call to the priesthood. That was my intention. And I feel that our Lord worked in little different ways, very small and little ways at a time to help me give that grace.

I’m coming out of this pilgrimage with greater vocational clarity. I’ve been with our Lord, adoring him six hours a day in the van. In the hardest circumstances too, it’s really hot, we’re sweating. We don’t know what bed we’re going to be in that night. He’s just really getting us out of our comfort zones. And I think He’s just working in ways to help me just trust Him in a much deeper, profound way than I knew.

With the wounded healer idea, I think he used this opportunity to open again those wounds that I’ve had, to open it again, and it hurt, but just to enter into it a different way and bring healing to it. Because as a priest, we’re wounded healers. We’re bringing the Blessed Sacrament to others to bring healing to them, to bring our Lord into their lives, into their darkest places, just as He’s entered into my darkest place and brought healing and light to that. So that’s why I’m taking away from this pilgrimage.

Velasco:
First, not taking Eucharistic Adoration for granted because we’ve spent hours and hours in front of the Blessed Sacrament, we’ve had hundreds of Benedictions, so we have had the most face time with the Eucharist throughout this entire trip. It would have been very easy to just slip away and just lay back and cruise and not take seriously that we’ve spent so much time with Jesus Christ this summer, possibly more than the saints had while they were on this earth, in the van, in churches, on the road, in processions. So really not taking Adoration for granted and the great graces that God wants to give to us if we are receptive to it. 

I feel similar to what Dereck was saying. I have experienced the joys and the sorrows throughout this trip because our trip was challenging. It was not easy to do what we just did for 65 days. We’ve had many days where we’re just spiritually desolated. “Enter,” as St. John of the cross says, “The dark night of the soul.” When we encounter God, both in consolation and in desolation, we can feel that we are journeying through tough times, but Christ walks with us. I think those are some of my big takeaways that I walk away with.

Catholic San Francisco:
And it really was walking with Christ. Like the apostles, you didn’t know where you were going to lay your head down the next day. Did that connect you more with our Lord too, and the Apostles?

Delgado:
We’ve done this for nine weeks, and most of those weeks there were just 10 of us in the van. One week, we had two extra people with us, two sisters who were with the Franciscan Sisters of the Renewal, so there were 12 of us in the van. We were driving and we’re going to stop by this coffee shop along the highway in Idaho and after we parked, I looked back at everyone, our Lord was exposed in the monstrance and everyone was quiet and praying and I said, “Hey, there’s 12 of us here right now with Jesus! We’re the 12 Apostles.” 

And that just hit everybody in that moment. And it was just so edifying – we are walking with Jesus Christ, the King of the universe, along this highway, to this coffee shop where he has probably never been before in His Real Presence, in the Blessed Sacrament. And it was just a moment of realization that this is a critical moment for our country, for our faith, but especially for our country and our Church.

Velasco:
And I think our group, in a way, also resembles the Apostles. All of us are very different, two seminarians, three men, three women. Some were still in college and some in grad school. So we represent really the variety of the Church that Jesus Christ called, all the different men and women. We are also representing the different qualities of our Church. And only two of us being from the actual west coast, the Lord called us together to journey with Him for two months.

It’s really quite remarkable that what we just did has never been done before other than the Apostles. It’s really something, a moment that I will never regret or take for granted.

Catholic San Francisco:
You brought a lot of petitions with you too, including from Maui. You brought the stick made from the wood from the fire. Can you talk a little bit about that, about the petitions that you brought? You don’t have to name them specifically, but what was that like to carry all of those prayers with you?

Delgado:
Whenever we stopped at a place, we went out in teams, two by two, to go and gather petitions. So not just petitions that we received in San Francisco, but also along the way.

And I just remember it clearly, whenever I ask somebody for a petition, they’ll think about it for a second. And almost without fail, there’s just this emotion that overcomes them when they realize how special this moment is, that we’re going to go with our Lord on this pilgrimage – full of sacrifice, full of penance, full of hardship – to ask for a reward back, to ask our Lord to reward us, help us to grow in our faith, but also for this special intention for this person.

Honestly, I just felt like I was entering into somebody’s very personal space. But I think I was an instrument of our Lord. I think He was entering into their personal space, it wasn’t me, but I was just an instrument. And even in that moment, just asking for a petition, I think He was bringing healing to them. And a lot of very personal feeling was shared, but it’s a vulnerability, I think, that they’re opening up to God.

Velasco:
Just to a cover a little bit about the walking stick from Hawaii, the Diocese of Honolulu had sent us this walking stick for us to use. Because we were too far from Hawaii to have a procession or have them join in, so they had sent this walking stick to our route specifically so that we were walking with it. The stick honors the victims of the Maui wildfires.

While we were in Nebraska, I was given the opportunity to walk with it, which was very powerful. I was just praying for all those that had suffered from those wildfires and are continuing to suffer. We may not be hearing much about it as we were, but I was remembering them. Obviously, before the trip started May 19, I had many intentions for my family, for the different parishes of our Archdiocese, for our Archdiocese as a whole, considering that we’re the only two.

Catholic San Francisco:
Yes, that was such a blessing that you were able to pray for us on the way.

Velasco:
Yes, and a lot of the intentions we received had been for peace in the world, for healing, for conversion of families, all very personal and all desiring that the Lord listens to them, that God would listen to their prayer. So many people would just ask us that we pray for them. It was very moving. Those were some of the intentions I carried.

Stay tuned for Part II with stories of how the St. Junipero Serra Route walked in the footsteps of the American saints, the culmination of the pilgrimage in Indianapolis, as well as other thoughts and reflections from the Perpetual Pilgrims.