Father Damien DeVeuster, the Belgian priest who devoted his life to those with leprosy on Molokai and then died of the disease himself, is edging closer toward sainthood. Claim of medical miracle
puts Damien closer
to sainthoodBy Matt Sedensky
Associated PressThe Diocese of Honolulu will formally launch a commission to investigate a newly reported medical miracle attributed to Damien, said Patrick Downes, the diocesan spokesman.
If that investigation finds the claim legitimate, and the claim withstands the scrutiny of theologians, doctors and scientists with the Vatican's Congregation for the Causes of Saints, Damien could be canonized. It requires the pope's approval.
Details on the reported miracle were scarce yesterday.
Downes said a local doctor reported a patient's spontaneous, unexplained recovery, attributed to Damien's heavenly intervention. Downes believed the healing occurred in Hawaii sometime in the last few years.
"There has been reported a miracle -- an alleged, unexplained healing," Downes said. "This is hopefully the miracle needed to get him through the final step toward canonization."
For canonization to occur, the commission must essentially prove to the Vatican that there was no scientific explanation for the patient's recovery.
The Rev. Joseph Grimaldi, vicar general of the Honolulu diocese, is heading Damien's canonization cause locally. Grimaldi was in meetings on the mainland and unavailable to provide details on the latest miracle claim.
Church officials said the Rev. Emilio Vega Garcia, postulator general with the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, the order Damien belonged to, is in Honolulu from Rome to investigate the alleged miracle. Messages left for Vega yesterday were not immediately returned. Church officials on Molokai said Vega was expected to visit the Kalapaupa Hansen's disease settlement, where some 40 patients still live.
Downes said the diocese planned to make an announcement of the commission's launch sometime in March.
Revered worldwide, Damien ministered to thousands of society's untouchables who were banished to the isolated peninsula on Molokai and left to die.
Father Damien went to Kalaupapa in 1873 at age 33 to minister to leprosy patients. Since his death in 1879, Damien's sainthood has been urged, but an organized effort was not led on his behalf until 1936.
Damien reached the final step before sainthood -- beatification -- in 1995, 100 years after a French nun dying of a gastrointestinal illness miraculously recovered. She had begun a novena to Damien before slipping into unconsciousness.
The report of a second posthumous miracle is good news for followers of Damien, who is honored with statues in front of the Hawaii state Capitol in Honolulu and in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington.
"We've been waiting a long time for this to happen," said Irene Letoto, who has directed the Damien Museum in Honolulu for more than 20 years, "but we think he's a saint already."
Letoto said she sometimes receives letters at her museum from those claiming they were healed.
The diocese's investigation and the visit of a priest from Rome, however, indicate this claim might carry more clout.
"I think this time, maybe they see something real, something that they could push through," Letoto said.