Lab Culture Club

FOCUS: FR. DAMIEN DE VEUSTER

             Divine Patron Saint of ALT Culture Club
I wrote a paper about Leprosy, the ancient and biblical disease, and published it in the MSN Groups website.  It disappeared upon migrating.  I could not find the original document.  Anyway, the subject is Fr. Damien.
Fr. Damien, a Belgian priest, served the leper colony on the Hawaiian islands of Molokai in the 1880s. 
Shortly after Hawaii became a state in 1959, there was a discussion which two state figures the state should honor with statues for the National Statuary Hall Collection at the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C.  Fr, Damien was selected for the honor along with King Kamehameha I.  Campaigning for him were Catholic groups -- Young Men's Institute and Holy Name Society.  Nearly 30,000 signatures were submitted to the legislature in 1961, despite of opposition because he was foreign born and a priest.  More than 66 artists bid to design the statue, and sculptor Marisol Escobar of New York City was chosen.  The new bronze statue was unveiled on April 15, 1969 and Fr. Damien was depicted by Escobar near the end of his life, with scars from his leprosy, and wearing his favorite traditional wide-rimmed hat. 
A second cast of the statue also stands in front of the Capitol building in Honolulu, next to a statue of King Kamehameha. By act of the Hawaiian State Legislature, April 15 is Fr. Damien Day in Hawaii.  His statue is draped with a lei on that day.
Fr. Damien died of leprosy on April 15, 1889.  He was canonized a saint by Pope Benedict XVI on October 11, 2009.