Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 29, Number 3, 1 March 2012 — Mother Marianne's saintly life [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]
Mother Marianne's saintly life
Her canonization is set for 0ct. 21
By Cheryl Corbiell n 1883, King Kalākaua and Queen Kapi'olani sponsored a letter sent to 50 religious eommunities throughout the United States requesting nursing help for Hawai'i's people with Hansen's disease, whieh disproportionately affected Native Hawaiians. Members of the Sisters of St. Francis in Syracuse, New York, agreed to eome to Hawai'i. The nuns' leader was Mother Marianne Cope, who heeame known worldwide for her leadership, nursing skills and compassion. The nuns rode trains across the continent and in San Francisco boarded a steamer to Honolulu. Mother Marianne Cope planned to return to Syracuse within a few months onee the other nuns were settled in Honolulu, but the journey to Hawai'i heeame a 35-year odyssey. More than 127 years later, Pope Benedict XVI proclaimed Blessed Mother Marianne Cope of Moloka'i a saint on Dec. 19, 2011. She will
be canonized Oct. 21 along with six other new saints. "It is amazing to have two saints, Cope and Damien, with ties to Kalaupapa on this little island of Moloka'i in the vast Paeihe Oeean," said Sister Jesse Kai. "December was a memorable month because the newly constructed Saint Damien of Moloka'i Church was officially dedicated on Dec. 16, and a few days later we received confirmation about Mother Marianne Cope." Blessed Father Damien heeame a saint in 2009. Cope arrived in Hawai'i in the fall of 1883, and the sisters cared for the Hansen's disease patients at the Kaka'ako Branch Hospital on O'ahu. Conditions in the hospital were deplorable because it was built for 100 patients but housed more than 200 patients. Cope and her fellow Sisters brought medical care and compassion to the patients. "Mother Marianne was courageous to journey halfway around the world to a plaee she knew nothing about," Kai said. "Women did not have a lot of rights then, although nuns had more
freedom than married women. Women did not normally hold important positions. Also there was an undercurrent of mistrust for Catholics in the Islands because it was a relatively new religion in Hawai'i. However, Mother Marianne forged ahead and her efficiency, leadership and good work was respected." In 1884 Cope founded Maui's first general hospital, Malulani Hospital at a time when medieal care was almost nonexistent in Hawai'i. The following year she founded Kapi'olani Home on O'ahu for healthy female children of Hansen's disease patients. In 1886, the Sisters took care of Father Damien when he was a patient at Kaka'ako Hospital during his advancing stages of leprosy, whieh is what the disease was called then. Damien appealed to the Sisters to replace him when he died. In November 1888, Mother Marianne moved the first contingent of Sisters to Kalaupapa, Moloka'i, to provide nursing care to more than 1,000 people with leprosy. Immediately, Cope opened the C.R. Bishop Home for homeless women and girls with Hansen's disease. Next, Cope organized people to grow fruits and vegetables to supplement meager supplies sent from O'ahu. As well, the nuns cared for Father Damien until he died in 1889 and assumed his responsibilities. Adding to her responsibilities, Mother Marianne was asked by the Department of Health
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Blessed Mother Marianne Cope's grave and monumenl in Kalaupapa. - KWO archives
to become the administrator of the Boys Home at Kalawao. She immediately undertook renovating the dilapidated building. After construction was completed, the building was renamed the Baldwin Home. Cope was a teacher, nurse, gardener, seamstress, disciplinarian, administrator and patient advocate during her three decades in Kalaupapa. The sheer cliffs of Kalawao were Cope's adopted home for the remainder of her life. She died in Kalaupapa on Aug. 9, 1918, at the age of 80. "Blessed Mother Marianne had a spirit of aloha for Hansen's disease patients when she answered the King's eall to eome to Moloka'i, and she was determined to provide a pleasant a life as possible for the exiled people of Kalaupapa," said Sister Davilyn Ah Chick. "Remarkable people live remarkable lives." ■ Cheryl Corbiell is an Instructor at the University ofHawai'i Maui College-Moloka'i anel a reading tutor at Kaunakakai Elementary School.
Blessed Mother Marianne Cope is surrounded by many significant images, including Father Damien, at left, and next to him, two Japanese girls whom Cope adopted, and Queen Kapi'olani, at right, in a painting by Moloka'i artist Philip Sabado. Sabado ean be reached at (808) 573-4993.