Damien De Veuster of Molokai

         Jozef De Veuster was born in rural Belgium in 1840, the youngest child of Frans De Veuster and his wife Anne-Catherine.  Many of their children had religious vocations.  Two of Jozef’s sisters became nuns and his older brother Auguste joined the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary.  His father hoped that Jozef would take a different path and work in the family business.  At 13, he dropped out of school to work on the family farm.  But in time, Jozef too would discern a call to religious life.  He decided to follow his brother’s path, entering the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary’s novitiate in 1859.  He took the religious name of Damien, possibly in honor of St. Damian, one of a pair of saintly twins from the 4th century and physician.  

          Damien was not considered a good candidate for the priesthood because of his lack of prior schooling.  His brother assisted him in his studies and ultimately the order decided to permit Damien to be ordained.  Damien had a deep desire to be sent as a missionary, praying daily before a picture of St. Francis Xavier, asking for such an assignment.  In 1963, Damien’s brother, now Father Pamphile, was selected to be sent to the Hawaiian Islands on mission, but before he was to leave he became too ill to go.  Damien sought permission of the Superior General to be sent in place of his brother.  His request was granted.  Damien arrived in Honolulu on March 19, 1864.  Two days later, he was ordained a priest in what is now the Cathedral Basilica of Our Lady of Peace.  His initial pastoral assignments were to the Catholic Mission in North Kohala on the island of Hawai’i.

          At that time, many Native Hawaiians were suffering due to infectious diseases that were brought to the islands by foreigners and to which they were not immune.  One such disease was leprosy, or Hansen’s disease.  Considered incurable and very contagious, the Hawaiian government passed a statute quarantining those suffering from leprosy to a colony of Kalawao on the Kalaupapa peninsula on the island of Molokai.  Over the next hundred years, around 8,000 Hawaiins were sent there for medical quarantine.  The colony was not meant to be a prison, but conditions were difficult.  The lepers were not allowed to leave and the Hawaiian Kingdom was unable to provide them with adequate food or supplies.  Given their health condition, becoming self-sufficient through farming and other means was a tall order.

          The Bishop of Honolulu knew that these people needed spiritual care, but sought volunteers only, as he understood those who went to Molokai would be putting their own health at risk.  Father Damien was one of four priests to volunteer.  The original plan was to send the priests in rotations.  Father Damien was the first to arrive in Molokai, on May 10, 1873.  After a brief time, the lepers and Father Damien asked if he could stay permanently.  

         During his 16 years in Molokai, Father Damien gave himself wholeheartedly to the community.  He built the parish of Saint Philomena.  He constructed resevoirs, homes, made furniture and coffins.  He treated the lepers’ wounds, buried those who died.  He started farms.  Most of all, he treated the lepers with humanity, that their dignity as children of God was unchanged by their leprosy.  He wrote to his brother that he made himself “a leper with the lepers to gain all to Jesus Christ.”

         Word of Father Damien’s work spread. Many sent financial support and resources to the community. Some came to personally assist in the work. Mother Marianne Cope and Joseph Dutton (both also featured on American Saints and Causes) were among them. Cope and her sisters established a hospital. Dutton arrived around the time that Father Damien became ill with leprosy. He became a friend and close assistant of Father Damien. Leprosy began to take its toll on Father Damien. In March of 1889 he was bedridden. Father Damien died on April 15, 1889. He was 49 years old. After his funeral mass, Father Damien was buried under a tree near where he first arrived on Molokai.

          Saint Damien De Veuster of Molokai is considered one of the patron saints of the Diocese of Honolulu, the State of Hawaii, and those suffering from leprosy.  In 1936, at the request of the Belgian people, the vast majority of Damien’s remains were returned to Belgium, where they are entombed in the crypt of Saint Anthony’s chapel in Leuven, Belgium.  Part of a bone from St. Damien’s foot is enshrined in the Cathedral Basilica of Our of Lady of Peace in Honolulu.  A relic of the right hand of St. Damien was re-interred in his grave in Kalaupapa at the time of his beatification. That site is now part of Kalaupapa National Historical Park, which is accessible to visitors under certain restrictions and subject to necessary permits.