Father Damien de Veuster, one of Hawaii’s most revered figures, was remembered on Friday by the state’s most famous — U.S. President Barack Obama.

The 19th century Roman Catholic priest from Belgium cared for people with leprosy, also known as Hansen’s Disease, who had been placed in government-sanctioned quarantine on the Hawaiian island of Molokai.

Father Damien, who eventually contracted the disease and died of it at age 49, is honored around the world as the “leper priest.” He is also considered a patron saint of those who suffer from HIV/AIDS and other diseases.

Pope Benedict will canonize Father Damien as a saint on Sunday, making him the first saint with such close ties to Hawaii.

“I recall many stories from my youth about his tireless work there to care for those suffering from leprosy who had been cast out,” said Obama, a Hawaii native, in a statement on Father Damien’s upcoming canonization.

“In our own time as millions around the world suffer from disease, especially the pandemic of HIV/AIDS, we should draw on the example of Fr. Damien’s resolve in answering the urgent call to heal and care for the sick,” he said.

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Photo credit: REUTERS/Chris Helgren (Pope Benedict XVI walks with U.S. President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama during their meeting at the Vatican July 10, 2009)

KAILUA, Hawaii - U.S. President-elect Barack Obama and his family will trade their plush Chicago home for a Washington hotel this weekend when they formally move to the capital.
 
The Obamas are still vacationing on the Hawaiian island of Oahu but are due to return to Chicago on Thursday in preparation for the relocation to Washington. Obama’s daughters Malia, 10, and Sasha, 7, are set to start classes at Sidwell Friends school on Monday.
 
“They will stay at a Washington hotel through the 15th and then they will move into the Blair House,” a transition aide said, referring to the guest residence across Pennsylvania Avenue from the White House.
 
The Obamas had asked to move into Blair House two weeks before the traditional date of Jan. 15 because of their daughters’ Jan. 5 start at their new school, but the White House said this was not possible because of previously scheduled events.
 
Obama will formally move into the White House on Jan. 20, the day he is sworn in as the 44th president of the United States.
 
The transition aide said Obama would continue to work on his economic recovery plan to rescue the United States from deep recession in the days leading up to his inauguration.

Photo credit: Reuters/Hugh Gentry  U.S. President-elect Barack Obama with daughters Malia and Sasha in Hawaii, Dec. 30, 2008

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KAILUA, HI - Barack Obama may be the first U.S. president who can successfully pull off the shaka, a Hawaiian greeting Hawaiians say has various meanings, from “hang loose” and “cool” to “thanks.”
    
The hand gesture, also a common greeting in surfer culture, consists of curling the three middle fingers and extending the thumb and little finger.
    
The president-elect, looking uber-cool with his White Sox baseball cap on backwards, flipped the shaka to a crowd of about 30 people as he left a gym on a Marine Corps base on the Hawaiian island of Oahu, where he is vacationing.
    
Obama, born and largely raised on Oahu, then walked over to greet the crowd, which had waited through a brief cloudburst to see him. Righting his baseball cap as he walked, he shook hands before posing with four babies.

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HONOLULU - He may be on vacation, but Barack Obama still has money to raise and Hawaii — his birth place — is as good a place as any to do it.

The Democratic presidential candidate, who has been relaxing on the golf course and eating out in his sun-swept former hometown, raised $1.3 million at a fundraiser on Tuesday that was attended by 500 donors including friends and former teachers who once knew the 47-year-old as “Barry.”

“What makes this night special is the fact that there are so many friends here. Some of you I grew up with. Some of you taught me in class,” he told the crowd.

He praised the Hawaii spirit and joked that he had wanted to come to the islands during the Democratic primaries but his staff wouldn’t let him.

Now that he’s finally made it to Hawaii, most of the U.S. states have had an Obama visit. “Alaska is the last holdout — and I’ve got to get up there,” he said.

Not this week. The Illinois senator has two days left of vacationing before heading back to the mainland, the campaign trail, and the spotlight.

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Photo Credit: Reuters/Hugh Gentry (Barack Obama walks out to give a statement while on vacation in Hawaii)