Much of Father Damien’s time was spent building coffins, digging graves, and administering last rites. Like the boundless sky above Kalaupapa’s moody clouds, Father Damien urged his patients to ...

But one famous example is Father Damien (now a saint), who spent more than 15 years serving patients at Kalaupapa before contracting and dying from the disease himself at the age of 49 in 1889.