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On May 11, 1873, the steamer Kilauea deposited thirty-three-year-old Father Joseph Damien de Veuster on the landing at Molokai. Bishop Maigret told the disease-ridden crowd gathered there that he had brought them "one who will be a father to you, and who loves you so much that . . . he does not hesitate to become one of you; to live and die with you."
Damien’s life was to become truly a sacrifice of love as he cared for those afflicted with leprosy, the disease ultimately consuming his own body. Eighty years after Damien’s death, Pope Paul VI said of him: “Love expresses itself in giving. Saints have not only given of themselves, but they have given of themselves in the service of God and their brethren. Father Damien is certainly in that category. He lived his life of love and dedication in the most heroic yet unassuming way. He lived for others: those whose needs were the greatest.”
As a Young Missionary. Born January 3, 1840, in Tremeloo, Belgium, Joseph followed his elder brother August into the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary. On October 7, 1860, as he made his vows, the twenty-year-old novice prostrated himself before the altar and…
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