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The Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace, also Cathédrale de Nôtre Dame de la Paix, located at 1184 Bishop Street in Honolulu, Hawai‘i, is the oldest Roman Catholic cathedral in continuous use in the United States. A former French mission, the cathedral is revered as the site where Father Damien, beatified in 1995 by Pope John Paul II, was ordained to the presbyterate. Mother Church of the Diocese of Honolulu, it is located in downtown Honolulu on the historic Fort Street Mall. It was officially dedicated on August 15, 1843. The Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace is designated as a National Historic Landmark on the National Register of Historic Places.
1 Edict of Toleration
The cathedral sits on a site donated by Kamehameha III on behalf of the royal governmentThe Kingdom of Hawai‘i was established in 1810 upon the unification of the smaller independent chiefdoms of O‘ahu, Maui, Moloka‘i, Lna‘i and the Big Island of Hawai‘i through swift and bloody battles, led by a warrior chief who later would be immortalized to the missionaries of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and MaryCongregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, ss. is a Roman Catholic religious order of brothers, priests, and nuns. The priests of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, ss. are also known as the Picpus Fathers, in honor of Picp, also called the Picpus Fathers who arrived on the brig La Comète in Honolulu from Bordeaux, France on July 7, 1827. The donation was one of a step towards healing a rift created in April 2, 1831 when the chiefs who had earlier met in Ka`awaloa returned to Honolulu to announce the expulsion of the two remaining presbyters of the Picpus Fathers, Fathers Alexis Bachelot (a French subject), and Patrick Short (a British subject). It required them to leave within three months on pain of property seizure and imprisonment. As both priests intended to stay, the chiefs then fitted out one of their own vessels, the brig Waverly in which to forcibly convey the Picpus Fathers to California. Both Fathers Bachelot and Short were placed on board and the vessel sailed from Honolulu on December 24, 1831. They landed at San Pedro near Los Angeles and went to Mission San Gabriel. They worked in the various California Missions until 1837. Meanwhile, Native Hawaiians who converted to Catholicism were persecuted and imprisoned.
The Congregational denomination became the preferred faith tradition in the islands. The expulsion of both presbyters, subjects of France and Great Britain, had several consequences, one of which was a visit in summer of 1832 by Commodore Downes of the U.S. Frigate Potomac who expressed to the King his disapproval of the policy to expel Catholic priests and punish native converts to Catholicism. Persecution briefly ceased in September 1832.
In 1833, the Vatican Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith issued a decree creating the Vicariate Apostolic of Eastern Oceania committed to the care of the Picpus Fathers under the episcopate of Msgr. Rouchouze. The Vicariate was divided at the equator with the northern portion committed to the care of Father Bachelot as Prefect Apostolic of the Sandwich Islands. The Prefect Apostolic, then in residence in Valparaiso, Chile, decided to send Father Arsenius Walsh, ss.cc., a British subject, to Honolulu. Father Walsh arrived in Honolulu on September 30, 1836. While the chiefs ordered him to depart immediately, the timely arrival of the French war ship La Bonite created a situation favorable to his staying on. Afterwards, a series of visits from French, British and American warships resulted in the chiefs being signatory to treaties and conventions negotiated on behalf of the foreign nationals domiciled in Hawai`i.
In November of 1837, Fathers Maigret and Murphy (whose recent ordination had been concealed from the chiefs) arrived in Honolulu on the orders of Msgr. Rouchouze. Father Maigret was denied entry; "Messr." Short was not. On December 13, 1837, at Lahaina, Kamehameha III issued an ordinance rejecting the Catholic religion. Word of this ordinance as well as Father Maigret's rejection reached Paris. The French government commissioned Captain Laplace of the frigate Artemise to "destroy the malevolent impression which you find established to the detriment of the French name; to rectify the erroneous opinion which has been created as to the power of France; and to make it well understood that it would be to the advantage of the chiefs of those islands of the Ocean to conduct themselves in such a manner as not to incur the wrath of France. You will exact, if necessary with all the force that is yours to use, complete reparation for the wrongs which have been committed, and you will not quit those places until you have left in all minds a solid and lasting impression." On July 10July 10 is the 191st day (192nd in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian Calendar, with 174 days remaining. Events 48 BC Battle of Dyrrhachium, Caesar barely avoids a catastrophic defeat to Pompey in Macedonia. 1778 American Revolution: Louis XVI of Fr, 1839Events January 9 The French Academy of Sciences announces the Daguerreotype photography process. January 19 British East India Company captures Aden January 20 In the Battle of Yungay, Chile defeats a Peruvian and Bolivian alliance. February 24 William Ot, the French frigateSailing frigates were 4th, 5th, or 6th-rated ships in the rating system of the Royal Navy. In modern military terminology, a frigate is a warship intended to protect other warships and merchant marine ships and as anti-submarine warfare (ASW) combatants f Artemise sailed into Honolulu HarborHonolulu Harbor also called Kulolia and Ke Awa O Kou is the principal seaport of Honolulu and the State of Hawai'i in the United States. It is from Honolulu Harbor, located on Mamala Bay, that the City & County of Honolulu was developed and urbanized, in and issued a manifesto for the freedom of Catholics to worship in Hawai‘i. Kamehameha III subsequently issued an Edict of Toleration effectively dismantling the ban on Catholicism and giving permission to the Picpus Fathers to establish its community and beliefs in the islands.
