On Monday, April 19, The Vatican approved the "heroic virtue" of Mother Marianne Cope, putting her on the road to sainthood. It was one of a series of decrees on sainthood causes approved Monday by Pope John Paul II. The German-born nun, who joined the St. Francis sisters in Syracuse, NY at the age of 24, worked for more than 30 years with leprosy patients in Hawaii.

Born Barbara Koob in Heppenheim, Germany, in 1838, she took the name Marianne in 1862 when she joined the Sisters of the Third Order of St. Francis.

It was in June 1883, in Syracuse, New York, that Mother Marianne Cope received an intriguing letter from a Catholic priest asking for help in managing hospitals and schools in the Hawaiian Islands. At that time, she was 45 years old and had been a Sister in the Order of St. Francis for 21 years.

She and six other Sisters of St. Francis arrived in Honolulu in November 1883. With Mother Marianne as supervisor, their task was to manage Kaka`ako Branch Hospital on Oahu, which served as a receiving station for Hansen’s disease patients gathered from all over the islands. Here the more severe cases were processed and shipped to the island of Molokai for confinement at the settlement at Kalawao, and then later at Kalaupapa.

Mother Marianne expanded the efforts of the Sisters of St. Francis to include managing a hospital and school at Wailuku on Maui, now the St. Francis Hospital.

In November 1888, Mother Marianne moved to the Kalaupapa peninsula on Molokai, where she remained until her death in 1918 at the age of 80. Mother Marianne never returned to Syracuse. She is buried on the grounds of Bishop Home in Kalaupapa.

Mother Marianne worked with the Belgian-born missionary, Father Damien de Veuster, who has already been beatified, for the last five months of his life.

The next step in the sainthood process for Mother Marianne is beatification, for which a miracle is required. Three years ago, the Diocese of Syracuse completed its inquiry into an alleged miracle attributed to Mother Marianne - a girl's unexplained recovery from multiple organ failure. A decision on that miracle is still pending.

An extensive and wonderfully written biography of Mother Marianne entitled, Pilgrimage and Exile: Mother Marianne of Molokai was written by O. A. Bushnell and Sister Mary Laurence Hanley and published by the University of Hawaii Press. Order a copy of the book.