Lenten campaign 2026
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The Forensic Sciences unit at Chaminade University is working closely with the Catholic Diocese of Honolulu on a rare and fascinating project: unearthing the bones — literally — of a Catholic saint.
Perhaps you've heard of St. Damien of Molokaʻi, the Belgian priest who ministered to patients at a leper colony in Molokaʻi, Hawaii, until he contracted the disease and eventually died from it.
Working closely alongside him was St. Marianne Cope, OSF, also known as St. Marianne of Molokaʻi.
An immigrant to the United States who settled with her family in New York and went on to join the Sisters of St. Francis, Mother Marianne Cope brought her Franciscan nurses to Hawaii in 1883, about 10 years after St. Damien’s arrival to the islands. She assisted in his mission at the leprosy (now called Hansen’s Disease) settlement in Kalaupapa.
Incredibly, she never contracted Hansen’s Disease, despite close contact with many patients. After 35 years of selfless service, she died of natural causes at the age of 80. She was canonized a saint on October 21, 2012, by Pope Benedict XVI.
St. Marianne Cope originally was buried on the grounds of the Charles R. Bishop Home for Unprotected Leper Girls and Women she had founded decades earlier on Kalaupapa. But in 2005, her remains were brought to Syracuse for reinterment at her motherhouse.
Again in 2014, her remains, except one first-class bone relic, were moved again. They were returned to Honolulu and are enshrined at the Cathedral Basilica of Our Lady of Peace.
After the original move, a number of small bone fragments remained in her original grave on Kaluapapa. Each of these is considered a relic, a blessed object worthy of veneration.
But there was no way to find all of these bone fragments — until now.
The Forensic Sciences Unit at Chaminade University — the only Catholic university in Hawaii — was enlisted to help collect these remains at the request of the Church. It’s the first time the local church has called on the Marianist institution to assist in this manner.
Researchers and students have extracted and studied soil samples containing bone fragments, recovering a number of precious relics.
Watch this KHON2 News report about their findings here:
Forensic anthropologist Dr. Vincent Sava is leading the work at one of Chaminade’s campus forensic sciences lab, using sifters and microscopes to separate bone from soil and rock, preserving Mother Marianne’s earthly remains for veneration.
The project is quite time-intensive, but each relic found means so much to the Catholic community of Hawaii.
Chaminade University junior and forensic science major Samantha Casarrubias and fellow forensics student Emma Rosales volunteered for the project, giving up a three-day weekend, and told KHON2 News how special the experience was.
Casarrubias said the week-long project is “very time consuming and tedious, but it’s good work.” She said:
I think that at that point, that's when it hit me, when I was actually pulling the bone fragments out — what exactly I was actually helping with, and how much it actually meant to the Church.
Fr. Martin Solma, SM, Chaplain and Special Assistant to the President at Chaminade University, told KHON2 News:
It's very special. It's very special. You know, we're a relatively small diocese, and yet we have two contemporary saints. It's a physical contact with holy people, just as the Eucharist is a physical contact with Christ.
The eventual goal of the project is for each Hawaiian island to have a relic of St. Marianne Cope.
