By Patrick Downes
Hawaii Catholic Herald
Bishop Larry Silva was invited last weekend to Stowe, Vermont, a place made famous by the von Trapp Family singers and its ski slopes, and has again gained renown, this time for a Hawaii connection, as the birthplace of Ira Joseph Dutton, the third sainthood candidate to emerge from the Hansen’s disease settlement in Kalaupapa, Molokai.
The occasion was the 180th birthday of Dutton, who has become known as one of Vermont’s favorite sons.
Hawaii’s bishop was there on April 23 to preside and preach at the 10:30 a.m. Mass at Blessed Sacrament Church, which stands on the site of Dutton’s birthplace.
Bishop Silva gave the Hawaii Catholic Herald a copy of his homily before he left Hawaii for Vermont on April 21.
“One hundred and eighty years ago this week, little Ira Dutton began his journey of life here in Stowe, as his parents and relatives rejoiced that this baby boy had come into the world,” the bishop said. “No one at that time had the slightest inkling that 180 years later, people from Hawaii and people from Stowe and beyond would be together to give thanks to God for his birth and his presence among us.”
The bishop compared Dutton’s journey to Molokai to that of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, the Gospel story for the day. It was a passage that started out with disillusionment and ended in recognition and “burning joy.”
Dutton’s “a journey of repentance took some twists and turns,” he said, “but it ultimately took him half-way around the world to isolate himself for 44 years with the most destitute and desolate outcasts of the world, those who suffered the scorned disease of leprosy.”
“His joy of knowing Jesus in the breaking of the bread was so palpable, that he was willing to make a journey back, sometimes in the dark, not always knowing where he would go, but a journey that would help him encounter the risen Jesus in disguises more distressing than bread and wine.”
The weekend of activities organized by Blessed Sacrament Parish includes a presentation of artwork on the church walls depicting Dutton’s life, and a screening of the movie, “The Wind and the Reckoning,” a film based on the true story of a Hawaiian cowboy named Koolau in 1893 who contracted leprosy but refused to go Kalaupapa, which led to an armed clash with the white authorities.
Other activities included a banquet with Hawaiian entertainment and an update on the status of Dutton’s canonization cause.
Part of the official sainthood process was scheduled to take place in Stowe that weekend, according to Bishop Silva, with the depositions of Vermonters by three officials for the cause for Dutton’s beatification and canonization, Msgr. Robert Sarno, Father Mark Gantley and Roxanne Torres. Msgr. Sarno is the bishop’s delegate for the cause, Father Gantley is the promoter of justice and Torres is the notary.
Ira Dutton was born to Protestant parents in Stowe, on April 27, 1843, and raised in Wisconsin.
He fought in the U.S. Civil War, rising to the rank of captain with the 13th Wisconsin Volunteers. Discharged from the Army in 1866, Dutton endured several tumultuous years with a failed marriage and alcohol abuse.
Dutton found solace in Catholicism and was baptized on his 40th birthday, April 27, 1883. He took “Joseph” as his baptismal name.
As an act of atonement for his turbulent post-war years, he traveled to Molokai in 1886 to join St. Damien in his work with leprosy patients. St. Damien affectionately called his American assistant “Brother.”
Dutton helped St. Damien until the priest’s death three years later in 1889, and remained in Kalaupapa an additional 42 years, administering the Baldwin Home for boys and men.
He died in 1931. His grave lies next to that of St. Damien on the grounds of St. Philomena Church in Kalawao.
