Saint Marianne Cope and Her Lepers
Saint Marianne Cope (+1918), whose memorial is on this January 23rd, was an American-born Sister of the Third Order of Saint Francis, who spent much of her apostolate working amongst the lepers in Hawaii. She was contemporaneous with Father Damien de Veuster (1840 – 1848), the ‘leper priest’, whom she tended on his deathbed.
Born Barbara Koob on this day in Germany in 1838, at Heppenheim, her family immigrated the next year to Utica, New York, anglicizing their name to ‘Cope’. When her father took ill, Marianne, in eighth grade, supported the family by working in a textile factory – not easy back then, before the labour laws we take for granted. It was only when her siblings had grown up that she followed her religious vocation, taking the name Marianne. For the first years, she taught, mainly German immigrants, before moving into health care, helping to set up the first two public hospitals in New York, offering care without regard for race or creed – again, a novelty in those days.
It was in 1883 that the plea came from the King of Hawaii, Kalakaua (it would not become a U.S. state until 1959) for help with the lepers on the island nation. The disease was then seen as highly contagious, so most demurred, but Sister Marianne did not hesitate:
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.’
I am not afraid of any disease. This is the response of the saints, a lesson the Church seems to have forgotten of late.
Sister Marianne arrived on the island with six others, on November 8th, 1884, and she never left, spending the rest of her life caring for the lepers, often left abandoned and bereft. She improved their condition immensely, confronting the corrupt administrator – it was she or him who had to go – fearless against all obstacles. She eventually moved to the remote peninsula where the patients with the worse cases were exiled, knowing she could never thereby return to America. Inspiring others, she received help from benefactors, and was honoured for her work, by both the Church and the state.
Unlike Father Damian, Sister Marianne never caught the disease, and died of natural causes on August 8th, 1918, just after the outbreak of the First World War, about which she likely knew nothing in those halcyonic pre-internet days.
We owe the Marianne Copes of the world a great debt of gratitude, for it was to consecrated women such as she that we owe our hospitals, schools and many other apostolates, now, sadly, too often usurped by others who share neither their faith nor their goodness.
Sister Marianne Cope was beatified by Benedict XVI on May 14, 2005, by decree of Pope Benedict XVI, and canonized by the same Pope on December 19, 2011. She was his first beatification, and his last canonization, before his own resignation in 2013. May the good Sister, now in beatitude, intercede for our beleaguered Church, and may all keep our focus on the work before us, in doing God’s holy and perfect will, without fear, and without compromise.
(source, in parte: wikipedia.org)
Carney’s Amoral Majority
After five defections – euphemistically described as ‘crossing the floor’ – and three by-elections, Mark Carney and his Liberals how have their coveted majority. One wonders what bowls of pottage were offered in back-room deals. In the archaic monarchical system that is the Dominion of Canada, this majority allows the newly-minted Prime Minister to rule[…]Continue reading→
Saint Kateri , Canada’s Protectress
This was the title given to Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, by Pope Benedict XVI, when he canonized her on October 28th, 2012, along with six others, in Saint Peter’ Square (she had been beatified by Pope John Paul II back in 1980). With Saint Joseph as our protector, along with the Canadian martyrs, we seem to[…]Continue reading→
Remembering Father Alphonse de Valk
(Today marks the sixth anniversary of the death of Father Alphonse de Valk, C.S.B., a faithful, courageous and indefatigable Basilian priest, pro-life-and-family apostle, and the founder of Catholic Insight magazine. Here is what we wrote those on his entering into eternity five years ago, as we continue to remember him in our prayers and thoughts)[…]Continue reading→
A Tale of Two Benedicts
A grace-filled Holy Week to all our readers! As we await and prepare for the Resurrection about to dawn upon us, we might keep in mind two Benedicts: Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, requiescat in pace, elected on this day in 2005; and today’s commemoration of the mystic pilgrim, Benedict Joseph Labre, who died on this[…]Continue reading→
My Name is Bernadette
April 16th is a propitious day, for besides the anniversary of Father de Valk’s death, who founded Catholic Insight in its print form decades ago, and the commemoration of the ‘two Benedicts’, mentioned in accompanying posts, today we also recall Saint Bernadette Soubirous, the young visionary to whom the Virgin Mary appeared numerous times at[…]Continue reading→
Saint Lydwina of Schiedam and Suffering Joyfully
Saint Lydwina of Schiedam (1380 – 1433) was one of the countless and glorious ‘victim souls’ in the history of the Church, those whose lives are filled with suffering, often of an unimaginable intensity, but who suffer joyfully. She was a fifteen-year old Dutch girl, out skating one day, when she fell and broke one[…]Continue reading→
The Glorious Martyrdoms of Martin and Maximus
As we enter into Eastertide, we recall on this 13th of April Pope Saint Martin I (+655), one of the noblest, if most tragic, of the successors of Saint Peter. Born in Umbria, Italy, he was of noble lineage, with great intelligence combined with charity and love of the poor and the Church. While still[…]Continue reading→
Canonizing Sister Faustina and Divine Mercy
HOMILY OF THE HOLY FATHER MASS IN ST PETER’S SQUARE FOR THE CANONIZATION OF SR MARY FAUSTINA KOWALSKA Sunday, 30 April 2000 1. “Confitemini Domino quoniam bonus, quoniam in saeculum misericordia eius”; “Give thanks to the Lord for he is good; his steadfast love endures for ever” (Ps 118: 1). So the Church sings on the Octave of[…]Continue reading→
Divine Mercy Sunday – An Echo of Every Mass
Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but believe’… ‘My Lord and my God!’ (Jn. 20:18)). Today is Divine Mercy Sunday, and as we celebrate the end of the Easter Octave, we contemplate the wounded side of our Saviour, the Church’s source of life. On Good Friday in the[…]Continue reading→
Saint Gemma Galgani
On this April 11th, in 1903 – the same year that the Italian Guiseppe Sarto was elected Pope later that summer as Pius X – a lovely, young Italian woman died, by the name of Gemma Galgani. She lived a brief life of 24 years, as did a number of other young saints, including Pier[…]Continue reading→