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Title

Father Damien De Veuster, ss.cc., to Bishop Hermann Kockemann, ss.cc., Kalawao, February 22, 1883.

Creator

De Veuster, Damien

Dates of Creation

February 22, 1883

Object ID

2023.1.78

Object Name

Letter

Other number

2114

Scope & Content

V.C.J.S. Kalawao, February 22, 1883

Bishop,

Thank you for your kind letter.

Here is what I remember from Waimea [1]. Strictly speaking, the land on which I built the chapel is not a property. I had made a request for it to King Kamehameha V [2] through the intermediation of Mr. de Varigny [3], then the King's minister.

This gentleman answered me: The King entrusted me to tell you that he cannot sell you the land of Waiaka belonging to the crown, but he is giving his royal declaration that you can build your church there and that nobody will interfere with your use of it as long as your church is there.

Bishop Maigret was satisfied with this royal declaration, which back in 1868, I placed not in the archives of the diocese but simply in the pahu [4] of the sacristy of said church. I don't know if my successors have kept it there. The yard of the enclosure, I bought for $15 from the Kanak who was cultivating it, but this does not constitute a property, because he was only renting the land. It was only a compensation for the construction of the yard. As to the donation of George, about whom Father Gulstan is speaking, it was another small yard makai [5] on the same property. This gentleman had a small thatch house on it, where I slept during the construction and which I let the guard, Joakimo Keaho and his wife Elizabeth Nakea use. It was only through the verbal agreement with George, who himself was not the owner of the land, that we had some right to it.

I have always managed the sensitivity of my dear confrere and conformed myself as much as possible to his own ways. I leave it to him to justify before the good Lord and his bishop, his prejudices and suspicions about me. Why does he attribute to self-love all I do for the honor and the good of the mission? I always think of the body to which I have the honor to belong and not at all of this miserable me. If I receive praises publicly, I accept them for the honor of the mission, but not for me. At the time, I disapproved of the division of the leprosy hospital into two districts, and I still disapprove of it today. For the honor of the mission, your Excellency would do well to come back to the terms, which you gave me when it was decided that Father Albert would come with me to Molokai. Excuse me, Excellency, for blaming you; it is just between you and me (private).

The good Father Albert will always have complaints, even in giving him free reign.

Pray for us in the SS.CC.,

Brother J. Damien ss.cc.

I will take care of the 55 masses that Father Clement is sending me.
__________

[1] The first part of this letter refers to the construction of a chapel in 1867 in Waimea on the Island of Hawai?i and the land negotiations surrounding the planning.
[2] King Kamehameha V (1830-1872), the last of the Kamehameha dynasty reigned from 1863 to 1872.
[3] See Letter 38.2.
[4] Cabinet.
[5] On the ocean side.

Admin/Biographical History

Jozef De Veuster was born on January 3, 1840 in the village of Tremelo, Belgium. He was the seventh of eight children born to Frans and Anne-Catherine De Veuster. His father intended for Jozef to take over the family farm someday. However, Jozef felt drawn to the religious life, like two of his sisters and a brother before him. At age 19, he entered the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary at Leuven. For his religious name, he chose Damien after a third-century physician-saint and early Christian martyr.
In 1863, Damien's older brother, Father Pamphile, was headed for the Sacred Hearts Mission in the Hawaiian Islands. A case of typhus prevented him from going. Brother Damien, with missionary zeal and unbridled enthusiasm, asked and received permission to take his brother's place. After a sea voyage of nearly five months, Brother Damien arrived in Honolulu on the Feast of Saint Joseph, March 19, 1864. For the next two months he studied the Hawaiian language and prepared for ordination to the priesthood at Ahuimanu College.
The ordination of Brother Damien and two others took place at the Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace in Honolulu, on May 21, 1864. His first assignment was to the island of Hawaii, where he labored for nearly nine years - first in the Puna district, and then in an area encompassing the districts of Kohala and Hamakua.
In May of 1873, Bishop Maigret blessed the first stone church of Saint Anthony in Wailuku, Maui. To the assembled priests, he expressed the dire need to provide spiritual help for the people of the Kalaupapa leprosy settlement. Realizing the risks and sacrifice that this would entail, the bishop asked for volunteers on a three-month rotating basis. Father Damien was the first to volunteer and accompanied the bishop to Kalaupapa. After seeing the paltry living conditions and despair of its residents, he decided to remain there. With no house to shelter him, he slept under the canopy of a pandanus tree for several days after his arrival. The tree stood next to the small Catholic chapel of Saint Philomena at Kalawao. This chapel was built a year earlier by Sacred Hearts Brother Victorin Bertrand.
Father Damien cared for the spiritual and physical needs of the residents of Kalaupapa. In addition to celebrating Mass and hearing their confessions, he built houses, an orphanage, and other structures. He constructed churches, both in Kalaupapa and on top-side Molokai. For those who died, he made their coffins and dug their graves.
His acts of compassion and advocacy for the patients of Kalaupapa earned Father Damien the respect and admiration of people around the world. In 1881, the Princess Regent Liliuokalani met Father Damien during her visit to Kalaupapa. She later made him, on behalf of her brother, King Kalakaua, a Knight Commander of the Royal Order of Kalakaua.
A medical examination in 1884 confirmed that Father Damien had contracted leprosy. In the face of this adversity, he stoically stated: "I have accepted this malady as my special cross." Despite his failing health, Father Damien continued to work up until a few days before his death. He died on April 15, 1889. He was buried beneath the pandanus tree that first sheltered him nearly 16 years earlier.
King Leopold III of Belgium later wrote to President Franklin D. Roosevelt requesting the return of Father Damien's remains to his homeland. On January 27, 1936, Father Damien's remains were exhumed from his grave at Kalawao. Much pomp and circumstance heralded the arrival of Father Damien's remains in Belgium on May 3, 1936. His remains now rest in Saint Anthony's Chapel in Leuven where Damien first entered religious life.
Public acclamation of Father Damien's sanctity was heard even during his lifetime. But, it would take 120 years after his death before he was officially recognized as a saint. Official acknowledgment began on July 9, 1977 when Pope Paul VI accorded Father Damien the title of Venerable. Pope John Paul II declared him Blessed on June 4, 1995. Finally, on October 11, 2009, Pope Benedict XVI proclaimed Father Damien a saint of the Church. His feast is celebrated on May 10, the first day of his arrival on the island of Molokai. A relic of Saint Damien is enshrined in the Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace in Honolulu. His right hand, the hand of blessing, has been reinterred within his original grave site at Kalawao.

Language of Material

French / Hawaiian

People

de Varigny, Charles-Victor Crosnier
De Veuster, Damien
Evrard, Clement
Kamehameha V
Keaho, Joakimo
Kockemann, Hermann
Maigret, Louis-Desire
Montiton, Albert
Nakea, Elizabeth

Subjects

Churches
Confrontations
Land tenure

Search Terms

Sacred Hearts religious

Legal Status

All rights of reproduction and photography reside with Congregation of the Sacred Hearts United States Province.

Notes

Translation #179 found in Father Damien's Letters (Rome: General Postulation of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts SS.CC., 2017), pp. 411-412. Reprinted with permission.

Copyrights

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LITERARY RIGHTS NOTICE FOR ORIGINAL LETTERS

All requests for permission to publish, quote, or exhibit from Father Damien's original letters in this collection must be submitted in writing to the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts USA Province. Permission is given on behalf of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts USA Province as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must be obtained by the user.

LITERARY RIGHTS NOTICE FOR TRANSLATIONS

All requests for permission to publish, quote, or exhibit translations of Father Damien's original letters in this online collection must be submitted in writing to the General Postulation of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts SS.CC.in Rome. Permission is given on behalf of the General Postulation of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts as the copyright holder.