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The Daily OrangeMother Marianne Cope comes back to Syracuse as part of her journey to sainthood
By Meredith Bowen
Posted: 2/11/05, 12:41 AM EST Section: News
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For three weeks, Sister Mary Laurence Hanley and Sister Grace Anne Dillenschneider walked the mountain paths of Hawaii, part of their quest to bring the body of Mother Marianne Cope home to Syracuse.
Their four-nun group traveled to the isolated Kaluapapa peninsula, where Mother Marianne devoted the final 35 years of her life to help those who had been exiled to the island of Molakai by leprosy. She grew up in Central New York before leaving for ministry in Hawaii, and is now a candidate for Roman Catholic sainthood. Her body was exhumed Jan. 27 for return to Syracuse as part of this candidacy.
At the end of her pilgrimage to Hawaii, Sister Mary Laurence, the director of the canonization and chief historian, put Mother Marianne's remains into the metal box that would carry her body back to the east coast. She said one of the nuns pointed out a rare double rainbow over Mother Marianne's gravesite, an affirmation to the years of hard work that had led to that point.
"It was like a little bit of heaven," she said.
Mother Marianne's exhumation and return are steps on the long road to sainthood that began over 30 years ago, when Sister Mary Laurence began work on Mother Marianne's official biography.
Mother Marianne has already met several of the requirements for sainthood - a biography has been written about her, and the Vatican must attribute one miracle to her. She can then be beatified, after which another miracle must be attributed to her.
Mother Marianne, who grew up in Utica, was born Barbara Koob on Jan. 23, 1838, in West Germany. She joined the Sisters of St. Francis in November 1862, when she took the name Marianne.
Mother Marianne helped found several hospitals, including Syracuse's St. Joseph's Medical Center. In the 1870s, she helped bring the College of Physicians and Surgeons from Geneva to a young Syracuse University. This college is now known as the State University of New York Upstate Medical University.
Mother Marianne left Syracuse in 1883 for the island of Molokai, where she was asked to work with the sick at Kaluapapa. The peninsula was Hawaii's colony for those suffering from leprosy, a flesh-eating disease.
"She took care of the AIDS patients of her day, the people who were almost put on the refuse heap of life," said the Most Rev. James Moynihan, bishop of the Diocese of Syracuse.
Despite the inherent risk of contracting the disease, Mother Marianne willingly took the assignment.
"I am hungry for the work ... I am not afraid of any disease, hence it will be my greatest delight even to minister to the abandoned 'leper,'" she wrote in 1883.
