The Priest Who Stepped Into the Colony

On May 10, 1873, a thirty-three-year-old Belgian priest named Damien de Veuster stepped off a cargo ship onto the rocky shore of Kalaupapa, Molokai. The Hawaiian government had banished nearly eight hundred leprosy patients to this remote peninsula, sealed off by towering sea cliffs. No one was forced to serve there. Damien volunteered.

He had no reason to go. He was healthy, gifted, and had a promising career in the mission field. The Bishop of Honolulu had simply asked for a temporary chaplain. Damien raised his hand — and never left.

For sixteen years, he bandaged wounds, built coffins, dug graves, and celebrated Mass with people the world had discarded. He dressed their sores with his bare hands. In 1884, he began his Sunday homily with two quiet words that changed everything: "We lepers." The disease had entered his own body. He had become one of them — not by accident, but by proximity, by choice, by love.

When Jesus waded into the Jordan River, He had no sin to wash away. John knew it and protested. But the Son of God insisted on standing shoulder to shoulder with broken, wandering sinners in muddy water. The heavens tore open, the Spirit descended, and the Father spoke His delight: "This is My beloved Son."

Jesus did not need those waters. But we needed Him in them.