Mother Marianne to return to Hawaii

Just nine years after her mortal remains where translated to the motherhouse of the Sisters of the St. Francis of the Neumann Communities in Syracuse, New York, Saint Marianne Cope will soon return to Hawaii.

The cathedral will receive the remains in a 11 a.m. ceremony on July 31. Mass celebrated by Bishop Larry Silva will follow at noon.

The Sisters of St. Francis of the Neumann Communities revealed their decision to relocate the saint’s remains last Dec. 19 with the announcement that they were closing their Court Street motherhouse in Syracuse where the remains have been enshrined in the chapel.

The remains are the full collection of the saint’s bones sealed in a 48-by-20-by-12-inch metal box. At the shrine in St. Anthony Convent Chapel in Syracuse the metal box was enclosed in a large, casket-sized polished wood reliquary.

The remains will arrive by plane in Hawaii on July 27 accompanied by Sister Roberta Smith, general minister of the Sisters of St. Francis, and Sister Geraldine Ching, assistant general minister. The box will be transported from Syracuse in a casket which will stay at the sisters’ convent in Manoa until the July 31 cathedral service.

At the cathedral, plans are to place the box upright in the existing koa and glass display cabinet that now holds a small reliquary with a relic of St. Marianne. The cabinet’s raised “floor” on which the present reliquary sits will have to be removed to fit the much larger metal box [more].

This news fills my heart with great joy and I look forward to celebrating with the Hawaiians the glorious festivities surrounding Mother Marianne's return to the people she loved so dearly.