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Two Saints of Molokai
Saint Marianne Cope & Saint Damien de Veuster
an excerpt from Spirit 2012-2013 by Joan Mitchell, CSJ
Only Mother Marianne Cope answered one of the 50 letters inviting religious communities to care for people with leprosy in the Hawaiian Islands. The request was made on behalf of King Kalakaua and Queen Kapiolani. Mother Marianne was a Franciscan sister. Perhaps St. Francis, who kissed a leper and gave the man his cloak, inspired her to follow his example and serve these outcast people.
On October 21, the Catholic Church will canonize Mother Marianne of Molokai. For 35 years she cared for the lepers of Hawaii and continued the work of St. Damien of Molokai, who was made a saint in 2009. Both cared for people no one else did.
When her father got sick, Barbara Cope quit school in eighth grade and worked in a mill to help support her family. At 24, she entered the Franciscan Sisters in Syracuse, New York. Never a nurse, Sister Marianne became the administrator of the sisters’ hospital in Syracuse and led it to become an outstanding teaching hospital. The sisters elected her their leader; she became Mother Marianne.
Mother Marianne and six other Franciscan sisters traveled from Syracuse, New York, to the Island of Oahu, arriving November 8, 1883. The sisters took charge of Kakaako Branch Hospital, which housed people suspected of having leprosy until they were sent to the Island of Molokai for the rest of their lives. The sisters put the hospital in order, cleaned people’s rotting sores, and applied soothing ointments.
Within a year Mother Marianne started a hospital on the Island of Maui for anyone who was sick, not just those with leprosy. Within two years she built a home for the daughters of patients with leprosy to protect the children from getting the disease.
Today we know most people (95%) have a gene that protects us from getting leprosy. Also, medicine today can cure the disease in just weeks. But earlier, to be a leper was to be an outcast. Doctors considered leprosy, now known as Hansen’s disease, contagious and incurable.
When doctors diagnosed people with Hansen’s disease, police locked them up and held them like criminals. Families often tried to hide and care for a family member with leprosy. Even young children were separated from their families. Boats took the people with leprosy to Kalaupapa and dropped them off to spend the rest of their lives there. Some 8,000 people with Hansen’s disease lived on Molokai over time. Most are buried there.
The bishop in Honolulu was reluctant to assign any of his priests to St. Philomena Church on Molokai, even though the people pleaded for one. To serve the people at St. Philomena meant the risk of contracting the disease.
When the bishop decided to send priests for three-month rotations, Father Damien volunteered first and never left. The head of his order wrote to him, “You can stay as long as your devotion dictates.” He served the people for 16 years until he died of leprosy at 49. Damien drew no difference between lepers and everyone else, between us and them.
Joseph de Veuster grew up in Belgium in a farm family of eight. He received the name Damien when he joined the congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary in 1859, a missionary order that served the peoples of the Pacific. Father Damien was ordained a priest at Our Lady of Peace Cathedral in Honolulu in 1864.
Sturdy and steady, Father Damien worked for nine years on the big island of Hawaii. He was five feet eight inches tall. He sometimes traveled 25 miles on horseback to make a sick call. He built eight chapels. He learned the language of the Hawaiians, who blew a conch shell to call people to church. Damien became a priest of the people. “I would gladly give my life for them,” he wrote.
In 1873 Father Damien went to the settlement on the Kalaupapa Peninsula. He slept under a tree for the first weeks he was there. People with leprosy surrounded him. They coughed. Their faces, hands, and feet were often disfigured. Many had smelly sores and little medical care. Father Damien reported that he started to smoke a pipe to counteract the smell when he visited lepers’ homes.
The people who lived at the settlement had a reputation for lawlessness. People had no reason to live and care about one another. They drank. They left people lying outside to die.
Father Damien aimed to help the people suffering from leprosy recover their human dignity. To bury the people with dignity, he fenced a cemetery, dug graves deep enough to keep animals away, and built coffins. He celebrated funeral Masses for those who died. He anointed those who were sick, washed their bodies, and bandaged their sores. He was not afraid to touch them. He sometimes amputated limbs when gangrene set in.
After six months Damien wrote to his brother, “I make myself a leper with the lepers to gain all to Jesus Christ.” Damien did not agree with people who thought leprosy was a punishment from God. He saw the disease as a suffering that he worked to ease. He established a special home for boys.
Steadily Damien used his strength to build small houses, so the settlement began to look like a village. He taught the people to farm and raise animals. He taught them to play musical instruments and started a band. He built a church.
In 1884 Damien was soaking his feet and realized he couldn’t feel the hot water. He knew he had leprosy. The disease destroys nerve endings in the body. He kept on building to finish all the work he could before the disease took the course he knew so well from caring for others.
Father Damien asked Mother Marianne to take over when he died. She led the first group of sister nurses to Molokai in 1888. A thousand people with leprosy lived there. She started a home where girls and women could live. She rebuilt the boys’ home after Father Damien died.
In his last two weeks of life Damien focused on a watercolor of St. Francis of Assisi, who in his prayer so identified with Jesus on the cross that he received the same wounds in his body—the stigmata. St. Damien received the same wounds in his body that he had treated in the patients from whom he never separated himself.
Father Damien died in 1889. Hawaii made Father Damien its representative in the statuary hall in the capitol building in Washington D. C. Today the whole Church recognizes Father Damien and Mother Marianne.
Read the rest of this issue, the first of SPIRIT for 2012-2013.
The Strength of Thomas
Jesus is alive! He is risen! We have celebrated the Good News! Now what?
With joy in our hearts, with belief in life everlasting, the work begins. Jesus breathes Spirit into us to continue the work that he started on earth. After Jesus’ resurrection, his disciples had to do the work of spreading the good news and building communities of life. Today, we are called to live daily in the good news within the history of our shared story. From Felicity to Mary, from Isaiah to Boniface, from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to Junipero Serra, and from Jessica to Lana, we see that the life Jesus calls us to will not always be easy. Transformation will not happen overnight. It will call us to face our fears and stretch our boundaries to go places we were not planning on going. If we truly live in the mystery of God who gives life, we may have an uncomfortable road ahead.
Whose work in the history of our Church’s ministry has inspired you? Why?
Who in your life do you see living out the Good News of Jesus? How?
Where do you see brokenness that Jesus might be calling us to in 2012?
How can you do justice, love kindness and walk humbly with God today?
When I get overwhelmed thinking about where Jesus may be calling me, I can find comfort in Thomas of all people. Thomas’ doubt in this week’s Gospel reminds me that I do not have to be perfect in faith. I can’t be. Even in my moments of doubt, God will love me for who I am. When Thomas touches the wounds of Jesus, he reminds me that the work Jesus is calling me to is grounded in real people, real bodies, real suffering. I look for the wounds around me and work to address the pain in my immediate community. Thomas also reminds me that I am not called to work alone. Every community working toward healing needs its Thomas. It is good to have a person who wants proof, who wants tangible things to work with. We need people who trust blindly, and we need people who think scientifically and didactically. In our faith communities, we can take turns being hopeful and skeptical. Thomas gets a bad rap for his lack of faith, but I see his curiosity as a strength in community.
What communities do you enjoy working within?
What role do you tend to play in a group?
What strengths do you bring to a working group setting?
We Are Only Human: An Odd Comfort
There are three scenes in this Sunday’s Gospel (Mark 14:1-16:8) that give me an odd sort of comfort. The first scene takes place in the Garden of Gethsemane, 
where Jesus has gone to pray. We are not told this explicitly, but one gets the sense that Jesus just needed to get away from it all, to be alone, to pray to God before facing what he was about to face. Jesus is honest with his disciplines, explaining to them that his heart is full of sorrow. Addressing God as Abba, a term of familiarity that indicates that Jesus thought of God as Father, Jesus prays, “Take this cup from me. But let it be according to your will, not mine.” Jesus first asks to be spared, but then in the next breath reaffirms his trust in God, indicating his willingness to follow God’s will and not his own.
This is a Jesus that I can relate to; this is a Jesus I know is there. At the times in my life when I have felt deep sorrow, the sort of sorrow that feels as if it will swallow you whole, I have felt the irresistible urge to be in contact with the ground. Prostrate on the floor, I have cried and prayed, prayed and cried, imagining that Jesus, too, once knelt on the ground in Gethsemane, in touch with the dust out of which human beings are formed and into which they will return. Of course, this does not take away the sorrow, but it helps somehow to know that Jesus felt something similar. It helps somehow to know that even for Jesus it was not always easy to follow God’s will. This Jesus gives me permission to ask God if things might be another way, all the while encouraging me to trust in God.
The second scene takes place on the cross. As people are gambling for his garments and taunting him to save himself, Jesus cries out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Scripture scholars have spent much ink debating about this cry of Jesus on the cross. From my perspective, it is an authentic cry of anguish. Yes, we know that the end of the story is resurrection, but in that moment, Jesus felt abandoned, alone, angry. And in expressing those emotions, in yelling out to God, Jesus gives us permission to do the same. We are allowed to be angry with God, to yell at God when we do not understand. It is okay because God is God, and God can take it. And again, while this does not take away our anguish, we can take comfort in the fact that Jesus can commiserate with us because he experienced these very same human emotions. This Jesus is not one who shies away from the hard emotions in life. This is a Jesus who walks with us through the valleys of death.
The third scene is the dramatic ending to Mark’s Gospel. While it was filled in by a later writer, we now know that the original version of Mark’s Gospel ended with the women fleeing the tomb, telling no one about Jesus’ resurrection because they were afraid. Talk about leaving an audience hanging! Again, we now know that this is not the end of the story. The women eventually did gather the courage to speak of what they had seen in the empty tomb, or otherwise we might not know of Jesus’ resurrection. But Mark’s Gospel as it was originally written ends with the women silenced by their fear, keeping to themselves, not knowing what to do next. In those crossroads moments of life, when I am not sure what I will do next, and also in the moments of life when doing what I know I should do just seems too hard, I feel a kinship with those women. It helps somehow to know that even the women who “saw” the resurrection for themselves struggled with faith. It helps somehow to know that fear and trembling are appropriate and even expected responses to the call of Jesus to go out and spread the good news.
These three scenes could be seen as dark and depressing. Maybe they are dark and depressing for someone who has never felt deep sorrow, deep anguish, deep doubt, or deep fear. But I have felt all these things, and knowing that Jesus felt them and that some of his closest followers felt them makes me feel less alone on my journey of faith. And perhaps most importantly, these three scenes remind me that it is okay to be human because that is what we are. I do not have to be perfect, and I am not expected to happily and unquestioningly follow God’s will. The journey of faith does not only encompass mountain top moments but also valleys of despair and doubt. And Jesus is not only with us looking out at the amazing vistas; he is with us most especially when we cannot see our way forward.’
Photo courtesy of stevenconger@sbcglobal.net via Creative Commons License“Paradise,” SPIRIT Xtra for April 1, 2012
“Paradise,” Coldplay, Mylo Xyloto, EMI Records Limited
Gospel Reflection: On this Sunday, we remember the suffering and death of Jesus. As we reflect on his suffering, we also call to mind the suffering we see in the world around us. “Paradise” by Coldplay reminds us of the suffering of those who have no safe place to turn to.
Key Lines: When she was just a girl/She expected the world/But it flew away from her reach/And the bullets catch in her teeth/Life goes on, it gets so heavy/The wheel breaks the butterfly/Every tear a waterfall/In the night the stormy night she’ll close her eyes/In the night the stormy night away she’d fly
Questions: Where do you see suffering in your Church or community? How do you show God’s love to someone who is suffering? When does loving someone cause suffering? How do you think God feels about suffering in the world? What do you think Jesus’ suffering teaches us?
Lenter Practices IV: Stations of the Cross
These last three weeks, I have written about three central pillars of Catholic practice during Lent: prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. This week I consider Stations of the Cross, which, while not a pillar of Lenten practice, is a popular devotional practice among many Catholics. Admittedly, growing up, I was not a big fan of the Stations of the Cross. On a practical level, it seemed long and boring. As I got older, I also objected to the focus on the suffering and death of Jesus. It seemed a bit too macabre for my taste; I preferred to hear about the angry Jesus who overturned tables in the temple, the compassionate Jesus who healed and helped those on the margins of the society, and the resurrected Jesus who appeared to his followers to shore up their strength and commission them to spread his message.
So in the spirit of renewal this Lent, I am trying to think about the Stations of the Cross in a different way. What is a station for? A station is place where you wait, like a train station. So Stations of the Cross are places where we wait, where we take time to reflect on the path of Jesus as he went to the cross. Like other practices of Lent, praying the Stations of the Cross causes us to use our time differently—to slow down and to reflect on distinct moments of Jesus’ journey to the cross—and to think about ourselves and our place in the world differently. What does it mean for my life that Jesus endured suffering, in order that he might die and be resurrected? What does it mean for my life that living as he did resulted in Jesus being crucified on a cross like a common criminal? These are not easy questions to answer, but they are necessary ones as we strive to learn from the mystery of Jesus Christ.
Stations of the Cross can also be called the Way of the Cross. It is one of the ways that we can fulfill the injunction by Jesus in the Gospels to deny ourselves, take up our crosses, and follow him (Mark 8:34, Matthew 16:24, Luke 9:23). Walking and praying the Stations of the Cross is like we are going on a pilgrimage without leaving home, as we follow in the steps of Jesus. And while it is not helpful to focus only on the suffering and death of Jesus, neither is it good to completely gloss over the crucifixion and the events that led to it. We all know that there is a dark side in the world (and in ourselves, if we are honest); odd as it may sound, attending to Jesus’ passion can give us hope as we face the darkness in our lives and in our world. It also teaches us lessons about courage, patience, and trusting in a God who promises to deliver us from all evil.
To participate in the Stations of the Cross, individuals or groups remember fourteen scenes (listed below) from the passion of Christ, that is, the suffering of Christ that ended in his death on the cross. Frequently, these scenes are depicted artistically—carved in stone, painted on wood—and arranged at intervals around a church building. Those praying the stations walk in the steps of Jesus, stopping at each scene to remember what happened to Christ and to say a prayer. There are also various on-line resources for individuals to use if they want to reflect on the Stations at home. Click here for one I have used and really like.
There are three things to remember if you are going to pray the Stations on your own. First, it is important to include a time of meditation at each Station, a time during which you reflect on what happened to Christ. Second, it is important to try to see ourselves mirrored in Christ and to consider how each Station may have application in our own lives. Ask yourself, what might this Station have to teach me today? What is it saying to me? What is it helping me to see or do differently? And finally, there are no set prayers that must be said at each Station. You can use prayers that are familiar to you (Our Father, Hail Mary, Glory Be), prayers someone else has written for reflection on the Stations, or prayers you come up with yourself. This gives you the freedom to interact with the Stations, to make them part of your own prayer practice.
Give the Stations a try this Lent, and let us know how it goes. Specifically, think about how each of these Stations connects to the lives of teenagers today.
- Christ Condemned to Death
- The Cross Is Laid upon Him
- His First Fall
- He Meets His Blessed Mother
- Simon of Cyrene Is Made To Bear the Cross
- Christ’s Face Is Wiped by Veronica
- His Second Fall
- He Meets the Women of Jerusalem
- His Third Fall;
- He Is Stripped of His Garments
- His Crucifixion
- His Death on the Cross
- His Body Is Taken Down from the Cross
- Laid in the Tomb
Photo courtesy of MEL810 via Creative Commons Licensing
God Metaphors
When I say God, what images come to mind?
As we grow in our faith, it is important to expand our notion of God so that God stays big and our relationship with God can continue to mature. It is helpful to use metaphors for God so that we can picture, conceptualize and talk about God. God is my Rock. God is King. God is Father. These metaphors bring up images and emotions for us. They also limit God. Even calling God God limits God. Language limits, so when we use language for God, it can be helpful to be critical of it as we use it. No metaphor can be expansive enough to capture the whole essence of God.
When I say God is my Rock, obviously I do not believe that God is an inanimate object. I believe God is dynamic and alive in the world. Rock is not a complete or perfect metaphor for God. It does not imply relationship. However, after living in the Rocky Mountains, I like to think of God as Rock because for me, the mountains carry with them a beauty, wisdom and steadfastness that is at the essence of God. When I stand at the base of a mountain, I am in moved to quiet awe. And so it is with God.
When I say God is King, that really does not do much of anything for me. I have never lived in a Kingdom, and from studying history, I know of many kings who were distant, corrupt, greedy and disengaged from people in need. That is not at the heart of who God is. I recognize that this metaphor does work for some people, conjuring up feelings of majesty and saying that God is in control. I appreciate Spirit’s suggestion this week to explore kin*dom as an alternative metaphor. Our world is in deep need of a sense of family.
When I say God is Father– or as Spirit challenges us, Abba– I enjoy the intimate nature of that metaphor. There is an affection, unconditional love and nurturing that comes with the metaphor for me. My dad used to walk with us for hours when we would cry as little babies. He would support us in any way he could as we grew. These are things I believe I can attribute to God. I am aware, however, that this metaphor will not work for people who have abusive fathers, or fathers who have abandoned them. And I believe that God has feminine qualities, too, and is also my Mother.
God is Wind, Creator, Fire, Redeemer, Fortress, Almighty, Counselor, Truth. All of these metaphors for God have strengths and limitations. I love holding two images of God that may contrast in my head simultaneously to keep God big. God is immanent and transcendent, for example. When my brain starts to hurt, that is when I know I am coming up upon my own human limitations to conceptualize God, who is beyond our understanding. God is God and I am not. God is both One I worship and One I co-create with here and now.
What is a popular metaphor you have heard used for God that does not work for you?
What metaphors do you use for God?
What are its strengths?
What are its limitations?
Photo courtesy of master.blitzy via Creative Commons LicenseLenten Practices Part II: Almsgiving
As I wrote last week, there are three traditional pillars of Lenten practice for Catholics: fasting, prayer, and almsgiving. This week I write about almsgiving, an ancient sounding word that may seem far removed from our current social lives.
“Alms” is a word from Old English that refers to something, like food or money, given to the poor. As a practice, almsgiving can include many things, such as making a donation to a charitable organization or tithing to a religious institution (that is, giving one-tenth a part of something). Almsgiving is part of our baptismal calling, as it is one way to take care of our brothers and sisters, both locally and globally, and to provide for the needs of the “least of these.” In a sense, almsgiving is putting money where our mouths are, that is, giving a material gift as a sign of our commitment to follow in the steps of Jesus.
Like fasting, almsgiving is a practice that encourages us to think about our lives and ourselves in new ways. Almsgiving encourages focusing on what we have to give, rather than on what we can get for ourselves. It also can help correct our attitude toward material possessions. Rather than hording our things out of fear that we may not have enough, almsgiving encourages us to express gratitude for all that God has given to us by giving some away. Small acts of almsgiving help us to grow in charity, leading toward recognition of Jesus Christ in the poor of our world. Almsgiving takes us beyond an attitude of “it’s just me and God,” as we respond to the needs of others, of those who participate in the Body of Christ with us.
Almsgiving is not just for the rich or just for adults. In fact, in Mark 12:41-44, Jesus praises a widow who donates two small coins. He even goes so far as to say that she gave more than the rich people, because she gave out of what she needed not out of what she had left over. You do not need to have a lot of money to make a big difference—this is the idea behind the Girl Up campaign, a program of the United Nations that encourages girls in the United States (and boys, too!) to give a high five ($5) to help provide medical care and education to girls living in poverty around the world.
During this Lent, how might you be able to practice almsgiving?
Could you donate 10% of your earnings from baby-sitting, tutoring, coaching, or other work to a charity of your choice?
Could you connect almsgiving and giving something up, donating the money you are saving by not eating chocolate or not drinking soda?
You can also get even more creative. Almsgiving and tithing do not have to involve money.
Take a look at your closet and what is in your room. Could you donate 10% of your clothes, items that are in good condition that you do not use but that someone else could? Do you have books in good condition that could be donated to a homeless shelter or school?
Think about how many hours of “free time” you have each week. Could you donate 10% of that time to charity or justice work—serving lunch at a soup kitchen, writing letters for Amnesty International, joining Big Brother/Big Sister?
What creative ideas do you have for teens who want to practice almsgiving during Lent? Share them here.
“Unholy Spirits” and the Power of Prayer
This week’s Gospel (Mark 1:21-28) describes Jesus commanding “an unholy spirit” to come out of a man. The people who observe this act wonder at the authority Jesus possesses, exclaiming that even the unholy spirits obey his word. Many people in the technological and scientific world of today might dismiss this reading, thinking it demonstrates the superstitious beliefs of people from long ago. We never have to deal with “unholy spirits,” do we?
*****
On an afternoon that was like many others, my friend Anna glanced up from her chemistry notes and told me she wanted to ask me something. Her mother, Kathy, had not been herself lately. Kathy got angry very easily, yelling at Anna and her siblings for seemingly inconsequential actions. Kathy seemed sad, distanced, and tired almost all the time, and she had stopped playing tennis and knitting, two of her favorite hobbies. Anna wanted to do something to help her mother, but also to help herself. Living with Kathy was making Anna miserable. Anna scheduled a meeting with someone at her church who did spiritual counseling, hoping to get some advice on what she could do to help her mom change. She asked me if I would go with her to that meeting for support.
At the meeting, Anna explained the situation to the counselor. She even offered to try to get her mother to go to counseling. What the counselor told Anna that day is similar to what Alateen members learn (see this week’s Spirit): Anna could not change her mother, no matter how much she wanted to. Anna was discouraged at this news; she desperately wanted to do something to help her mother. I have never forgotten what the counselor said next: “You cannot change your mother, but that doesn’t mean there is nothing you can do. You can pray for her.”
That afternoon, Anna and I prayed for Kathy together. Anna asked me if I would keep praying for Kathy, and I did, every night before I went to bed. Although I never asked, I am sure that Anna prayed for Kathy all the time, too. I am sure of this because a few years later when I visited Anna’s house over a break from college, the mood was entirely different than it had been when Anna and I were in high school. Kathy seemed happier, more like her old self. When I asked Anna if she, too, noticed a change her mom, she smiled. She showed me a scarf and hat set her mom had knitted for her and confided in me that Kathy had been seeing a counselor for a few years and had been honest with Anna about how hard she was working to make changes in herself. “I think our prayers worked,” Anna concluded.
*****
Just because we live in a technological and scientific age, I still believe people have to deal with “unholy spirits.” When we think broadly, so many things could be included in this category: alcoholism and other forms of addiction; depression and other forms of mental illness; rampant consumerism and other consequences of living in a mass media culture… And while it is true that we cannot change or control other people, there is one curative option open to all of us, as Anna discovered: we can pray. And while the healing may not be as quick as that experienced by the man with the unholy spirit in Mark’s Gospel (or may not even happen in our lifetime), we can trust that Jesus continues to speak with authority, working in people’s hearts to help them expel that which keeps them from living fully into their identity as children of God and followers of Christ.
What “unholy spirits” do you think affect people in our society? For whom can you pray?
“Sing” – SPIRIT Xtra for November 20, Feast of Christ the King
“Sing,” My Chemical Romance, Sing – The Deluxe Single, Reprise Records
Gospel Reflection: In this Sunday’s gospel Jesus reveals that we will find him when we care for those in need, the ones he calls “the least of these.” He challenges us to live out our faith through helping others. “Sing” encourages us to use our voices for services to others.
Key Lines: Sing it from the heart/Sing it till you’re nuts/Singing out for the ones that’ll hate your guts/Sing it for the deaf/Sing it for the blind/Sing about everyone that you left behind/Sing it for the world, sing it for the world
Questions: How can you use your voice for “the least of these?” What risks do you take when you speak out? Where do you see Jesus present in your community? How is doing an act of charity an expression of faith? What opportunities for service does your church or school provide? How can you get more involved?
adapted from SPIRIT Xtra for Teens 2011-2012 by Johanna Hatch
SPIRIT 4 Teens 