Around the world, Catholics celebrate St. Damien on his feast day — May 10. In Kalaupapa, where his legacy of service and ministry to those with Hansen's disease lives on, he is honored with special gratitude.
“I like to share all that Damien had done, in his unconditional love for people, his openness to help out wherever the need is,” said Sister Alicia Damien Lau, one of the Sisters of St. Francis, who lives in Kalaupapa.
“He was able to open up himself to work with people, to be there for them. He didn't have it easy," she said. "You know, his job when he came here, when he saw not only the devastating graveyards that was there and all the animals that were digging into it, the first thing he did was to be able to bury them deeper, but also to be able to build coffins for them.”
In 1873, Father Damien volunteered to serve in Kalaupapa, where patients of Hansen's disease were forcibly exiled, facing extreme hardship and a lack of care. Damien (who was born Jozef De Veuster in Belgium) lived there for 16 years, bringing hope, love and a sense of community, before he died of the disease in 1889.
The Catholic Church declared Father Damien a saint in 2009.
Lau said in Kalaupapa, donors sent snacks and treats to the settlement and she and Sister Barbara Jean Wajda worked to distribute them in the community to celebrate St. Damien's feast day.
“It's a time of remembrance,” she explained. “[All the staff in Kaluapapa] know about Damien — they're out there, you know, cleaning the yard at St. Philomena’s [Church, used by St. Damien]. They do a wonderful job in keeping Damien's road nice and clean, you know. So everybody has a part in upkeeping Kalaupapa and Kalawao. So it was an opportunity for Sister and I to say, ‘Thank you.’”
