Groundbreaking The first Catholic missionaries to Hawaii, three priests of the
Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary (also known as the Society of Picpus), arrived in Honolulu from France on July 7, 1827.
Apostolic prefect Alexis Bachelot celebrated the first recorded
Catholic Mass on Hawaiian soil on July 14 in a grass hut on a rented lot. On this property, in January 1828, the French erected the first Catholic church in Hawaii where the sanctuary of the cathedral is today. However, King
Kamehameha III under pressure by both American
Protestant missionaries and the
Kuhina Nui,
Kaʻahumanu, Catholic priests were expelled from the islands between 1829 and 1839 to thwart any French or Catholic influence. During this “dark decade” of anti-Catholic persecution, foreign priests were deported and not allowed to come to shore, and known converts were tortured and imprisoned. Under the threat of force from the French government, the
Hawaiian government issued the
Edict of Toleration on June 17, 1839, creating
freedom of religious expression. As reparation, Kamehameha III gave the first Roman Catholic missionaries under the leadership of
Vicar Apostolic Étienne Rouchouze, a piece of the royal estate on which to build the first Roman Catholic church in the kingdom and $20,000 in compensation for the deportation of priests and the incarceration and torture of converts. The
1840 Constitution of the Kingdom of Hawaii enshrined religious liberty. The missionaries broke ground for the new church on July 9, 1840, coinciding with the Feast of
Our Lady of Peace,
patroness saint of the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts and dedicated their first church in the new land under this title of the Virgin Mary.
Development On August 15, 1843, the Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace was consecrated and dedicated, and about 800 people received
holy communion. When
Louis Désiré Maigret inherited the church, the interior was furnished with a simple wooden
altar,
communion rail and
pulpit. Instead of
pews, the
native Hawaiians preferred to sit on the floor covered in
lauhala mats. Maigret had purchased a tower clock and
cathedra, and a new larger
bell. Maigret had built the first domed bell tower in the Hawaiian Islands, but he would later replace it with a wooden
spire topped with a
globus cruciger and a stationary rooster
finial in 1866, often mistaken for a
weather vane. In the 1870s, after returning from the
First Vatican Council, Maigret was inspired to continue improvements to the cathedral. In 1871, the low roof was replaced with
redwood and raised by four feet. A vaulted ceiling with panels of hand-painted gold leaf decorations was installed. A choir loft and galleries overlooking the nave were built to increase the seating capacity and new
stained glass windows were added. Throughout his thirty-five years as bishop, Maigret transformed the humble grass hut into a European-styled church before dying in 1882. Sweeney, a
council father at the Second Vatican Council, ordered for the communion rails to be removed and a freestanding altar constructed to allow a priest to face the congregation during Mass instead of
ad orientem as indicated in the changes to the new
Roman Missal. The elevated canopied
pulpit was also removed in favor of a simple
lectern to serve as an
ambo. The ideology of this time encouraged churches to use native cultural implements in church architecture.
Koa wood
wainscot along the walls and heavy koa wood doors were installed. Other major plans include building a new chapel that will house the relics of both St.
Damien de Veuster and St.
Marianne Cope. By 2018, at the hundred seventy-fifth anniversary of the dedication of the cathedral, Silva removed the screen and returned the altar back to an extensively renovated sanctuary area. The pews were also positioned back to their direction. Four of the fourteen stained-glass windows were repaired and refurbished in
Omaha. A few years later, the pillars were repaired and replastered then repainted to mimic marbled stone, and new paintings of saints Damien and Marianne were placed in the sanctuary wall above the high altar. ==Historical significance==