Timeline Father Damien

On January 3rd 1840, Jozef De Veuster was born in Tremelo-Ninde.

Jozef De Veuster goes to boarding school at the Braine-le-Comte trade school to learn French. On Christmas Day, December 25th, 1858, he informs his parents by letter that he is opting for a religious life.

On February 2nd, 1859, Damien, like his brother Gust, enters the Congregation of the Fathers of the Sacred Hearts. Jozef was given a new name: Damien.

Damien departs from Bremerhaven, Germany, on November 9th 1863 for the Hawaiian Islands.

After a boat journey of almost five months, Damien arrived at the port of Honolulu, the capital of the Hawaiian Islands, on March 19th 1864.

Bishop Louis Maigret ordained Damien to the priesthood on May 21st, 1864 in the Cathedral of Honolulu.

From 1864 to 1873, Damien worked as a missionary on the island of Hawaii, the largest of the Hawaiian Islands.

In January 1865, the first official decree was issued to combat the spread of leprosy in the kingdom of Hawaii. On January 6th 1866, the first exiled Hawaiians with leprosy arrived in Kalaupapa, Molokai's leper settlement.

On 10 May 1873, Damien arrived in Kalaupapa, Molokai's leper settlement. In the same year, the Norwegian physician Gerhard Armauer Hansen discovers the leprabacillus.

In September 1881, Princess Liliuokalani visits Damien. The Hawaiian royal family gives Damien the highest royal award for his commitment to helping people in need.  

In 1886, Damien was officially entered in the register of the leper settlement of Kalaupapa, Molokai.

Together with sick Hawaiians in the leper settlement of Molokai, Damien is literally and figuratively building a community. Without Hawaiian help, he stands nowhere. Only at the end of his life does Damien receive the help he has been asking for, for so long. American veteran Joseph Dutton arrived in 1886, followed in 1888 by Belgian priest Lambert Louis Conrardy, his fellow German brother Wendelin Moellers and the American Franciscan Sisters led by Mother Marianne Cope.

British painter, gentleman and philanthropist Edward Clifford pays his good friend Damien a visit on Molokai in December 1888. He brings lots of gifts, celebrates Christmas together and takes extensive time to talk to Damien and portray him and the landscape. 

On April 15th 1889, Damien passed away. He found a resting place under the pandanus tree in the shadow of St Philomena's church in the leper settlement of Molokai.

Damien is exhumed on Molokai in 1936 and transferred to Belgium. The training ship Mercator eventually takes him to the port of Antwerp. From Antwerp, it goes via Tremelo to Leuven, where Damien is given a new resting place in the Saint Anthony Chapel of the Fathers of the Sacred Hearts.

'Damien Action' was founded in 1964. Following in Damien's footsteps, this medical NGO is still today committed to helping people with leprosy worldwide.

Pope Paul VI was handed a petition in 1967 in which Hindus, Christians, Muslims and Buddhists asked him to canonize Damien as soon as possible.

Damien represents the state of Hawaii at the Capitol in Washington D.C. since 1969.

In the same year, the Hawaiian secession law of 1865 is abolished.

To mark the 100th anniversary of Damien's death in 1989, grand celebrations take place in Belgium and Hawaii.

Pope John Paul II beatified Damien on June 4th 1995 in Koekelberg, Brussels.

Damien's right hand is solemnly reburied at the leper settlement on Molokai on July 22nd 1995.

In 2005, Damien was voted Greatest Belgian.

Pope Benedict XVI declared Damien a saint on October 11th 2009 in Rome.

Tremelo municipality makes Damiaan first honorary citizen on 11 October 2015.