By CAROLE BRESLIN
In the hills outside of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, is a leper settlement, Sungai Buloh, located in a lush valley. It is an excellent model for proper urban planning. Lovely gardens, sewers, and wells, churches and other places of worship virtually eliminate the need to leave the village.
With a cure having been found for leprosy, the patient population there has diminished, but their industry in growing some of the most beautiful plants in the country brings people from miles around to purchase them.
Conditions were not like that in the 19th century when lepers were exiled to Molokai, Hawaii, where Marianne Cope eventually went to minister to them.
When Sr. Marianne was born, her father, Peter Koob, and her mother, Barbara Witzenbacher Koob, named her Barbara. She was one of ten children.
The farmer and his wife lived in West Germany about 50 miles south of Frankfurt. Shortly after Barbara’s birth on January 23, 1838, the family moved from Germany to Utica, N.Y.
The Industrial Revolution was in full swing, enabling Peter to find work in a factory. The children settled into the school at St. Joseph’s Parish. From an early age Barbara yearned to enter religious life, but God’s plan called for delay.
When Barbara had just completed eighth grade, her father became incapacitated, so she had to work in the local textile mill to support the family. Not long after this, her father received his United States citizenship which also included his wife and children.
Her father lingered for a few more years and finally died in the summer of 1862. With her father gone and her siblings old enough to support her mother, Barbara’s dream of entering the religious life could now be realized.
She left for Syracuse, N.Y., about 55 miles west of Utica where she entered the Sisters of St. Francis. On November 19, 1862 she received the habit and took the name Sr. Marianne. As a sister she taught and served as a principal at several elementary schools in the state of New York.
Although she joined with the goal of teaching, her administrative skills brought her appointments to positions of great responsibility. She soon became a member of her order’s governing board. Thus she played a major role in the establishment of two hospitals in the central part of New York state.
This experience then led to her beginning a new ministry in 1870. Sr. Marianne became a nurse administrator at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Syracuse. Then she served six more years as head administrator.
Having thus demonstrated her administrative skills, she now proved her talent for working with people. Motivated by God alone — possessed of zeal for serving Him through serving her neighbors — she developed a positive work environment known for both its efficiency and compassion.
In these hospitals, Sr. Marianne accepted all persons: rich or poor, those with “respectable” illnesses as well as those suffering from addictions. Her acceptance of the indigents brought her much criticism, but she stood firm in serving them, proving her sincerity and kindness.
News of her compassion, efficiency, and industriousness quickly spread across the country. In 1883 she received a letter from a distant land — Hawaii. A priest wrote, begging her to help him manage the hospitals and schools in Hawaii, and, most important, to help serve the victims of leprosy. Over 50 other orders had been contacted, but they all declined his appeal for help.
Who would want to serve people who were dying of a contagious disease? Only a person in love with Christ would do it. Sr. Marianne, seeking only to do the will of God, joyfully accepted the opportunity to serve the most wretched people in Hawaii.
The letter touched her compassionate heart. She immediately replied to the priest that she and six of her sisters would leave as soon as possible for the tropical islands of Hawaii. She wrote, “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 delight even to minister to the abandoned lepers’.”
Marianne and her sisters arrived in Hawaii on November 8, 1883. Their first chore in Hawaii was to manage the Kaka’ako Branch Hospital in Oahu, the receiving station for the victims of leprosy, who were exiled from the other Hawaiian islands. From there the most severe cases were moved to the nearby island of Molokai for resettlement at Kalawao, on the eastern side of Molokai’s Kalaupapa Peninsula.
In just two years, the sisters had the hospital running smoothly with the patients receiving much more humane treatment. This success in turn led to her being requisitioned by the government to set up the first general hospital on Maui. After a brief while, however, she returned to Oahu when she learned the lepers were being mistreated.
In 1885, the king awarded Mother Marianne the Cross of a Companion of the Royal Order of Kapiolani for her heroic and outstanding work in the hospitals.
Another saint, Fr. Damien de Veuster, had begun serving the leprosy victims on Molokai in 1873, years before Marianne and her sisters arrived there. Marianne met him for the first time in January 1884, when Damien still appeared to be in good health.
Mother Marianne accepted him as both friend and patient, when his leprosy was diagnosed in 1886. Sadly, he was an unwelcome visitor to the civil and church leaders in Honolulu, who wanted him isolated on Molokai.
Then, when a new Hawaiian government took over in 1887, it closed the Oahu hospital and began a severe enforcement of isolation policy for lepers. Hawaii’s isolation law had been approved in 1865.
Once again the victims of this dreaded disease were abandoned and once again Mother Marianne and her sisters joyfully embraced the opportunity to care for these marginalized citizens of Hawaii.
Mother Marianne, Sr. Leopoldina Burns, and Sr. Vincentia McCormick met with Fr. Damian, consoling him in his last hours by pledging to care for the lepers of Molokai. They promised to continue working in the Boys’ Home at Kalawao that he had founded.
They also undertook the running of the Bishop Home for girls. The work was unending, and at times the sisters became overwhelmed with exhaustion, both physically and emotionally; but Mother Marianne provided them an excellent model of cheerfulness and hope.
She told them that her most important goal was “to make life as pleasant and as comfortable as possible for those of our fellow creatures whom God has chosen to afflict with this terrible disease.” Nevertheless, she did call for help and received it in 1895 when four Brothers of the Sacred Heart arrived to take over the Boys’ Home. The sisters then focused on the home for the girls.
Mother Marianne continued to serve the lepers until her death August 9, 1918. Despite her long and close work with victims of leprosy, she never contracted the disease. Marianne was canonized by Pope Benedict XVI on October 21, 2012. Her feast is celebrated on January 23.
Dear St. Marianne, help us to see the eternal consequences of our actions. Let us not dread any temporal diseases, but rather fear the spiritual decay that comes with ignoring the suffering among us. Intercede for us to serve those in need as selflessly as you did. Amen.
+ + +
(Carole Breslin home-schooled her four daughters and served as treasurer of the Michigan Catholic Home Educators for eight years. For over ten years, she was national coordinator for the Marian Catechists, founded by Fr. John A. Hardon, SJ.)
Powered by WPtouch Mobile Suite for WordPress