Which Catholic saint served people with leprosy on the Hawaiian island of Molokai?

Saint Damien of Molokai served people with leprosy on the Hawaiian island of Molokai.

Damien de Veuster was born in Belgium in 1840 and joined the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary. He volunteered for missionary work in Hawaii and was ordained a priest in Honolulu in 1864. In 1873 he went to Kalaupapa, a settlement on Molokai where people with Hansen’s disease had been isolated.

Damien provided pastoral care and helped residents build houses, roads, sanitation systems, and a more organized community. He eventually contracted Hansen’s disease himself and died on Molokai in 1889.

He became widely known as a symbol of solidarity with people who were stigmatized by illness. Pope Benedict XVI canonized him in 2009. He is sometimes confused with Marianne Cope, who also served the Molokai community, but Damien was a Belgian priest and she was an American religious sister.