January 23--St. Marianne Cope (St. Marianne of Moloka’i), Virgin and Religious

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Today’s saint went to minister to people who were infected with a highly contagious disease, knowing she could contract it and die. It wasn’t Covid, but rather, Hansen’s disease, leprosy. When she received the plea from King Kalākaua of Hawai’i, she responded: “I am hungry for the work and I wish with all my heart to be one of the chosen Ones, whose privilege it will be, to sacrifice themselves for the salvation of the souls of the poor Islanders... I am not afraid of any disease, hence it would be my greatest delight even to minister to the abandoned ‘lepers.’” 

Born in Germany in 1838, her family emigrated to Utica, New York where her father worked in a factory. When her father died in 1862, she joined the Sisters of the Third Order Regular of St. Francis. She became a teacher, principal, and hospital administrator. By 1883 she was Superior General of the congregation and answered the call to go to Hawai’i with six sisters. Her first responsibility was to manage a hospital on Oahu to process leprosy patients. Then she opened a general hospital, reformed government abuse of lepers, opened a home for homeless female children of leprosy patients, opened a home for leprous women and girls on Moloka’i, cared for St. Damien of Moloka’i, and took over his ministry when he died. She stayed in Hawai’i until her death in 1918, due to natural causes. She was canonized by Pope Benedict XVI in 2012.

St. Marianne Cope rejoiced when she found she would not return to New York: “We will cheerfully accept the work….” We are also thrown into difficult circumstances at times; the current pandemic is one of them. Let us maintain our cheerfulness in ministering to our brothers and sisters. St. Marianne Cope, pray for us.

* https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4c/Mother_Marianne_Cope_statue.jpg billsoPHOTO, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

May 10—St. Damien de Veuster of Molokai, Priest

“Unclean, unclean.”  These words were shouted by those in the Bible who had the disease of leprosy, what is now called Hansen’s Disease.  It is mentioned in the Bible 68 times, 15 in the New Testament and was often thought of as curse from God for sin.  It is a highly infectious disease that affects the nervous system and causes disfigurement.  One of the amazing effects of Hansen’s Disease is that the infected cannot feel pain, leading to lack of awareness of harm caused to the body.

St. Damien of Molokai dedicated his life to serving the leper colony on Molokai in the 19^th century.  The lepers of Molokai were shunned by the rest of society.  St. Damien did what he could to return their sense of God-given dignity by his service.  He persuaded another saint, St. Marianne Cope to bring her sisters to help minister to them.  He buried many of his people, digging their graves himself.  Eventually, he contracted Hansen’s Disease and had to stay as a member of his beloved community.  He also died, and was buried on Molokai, where part of his body remains to this day.

When Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI canonized St. Damien he remarked:  “He invites us to open our eyes to the forms of leprosy that disfigure the humanity of our brethren and still today call for the charity of our presence as servants, beyond that of our generosity."  Who among us is disfigured and shunned?  Is it the homeless, those with mental diseases or syndromes, the unborn, the poor, the marginalized?  We need to hear the unheard cry of “Unclean, unclean” and minister to them.