Saint Marianne Cope Museum celebrates Feast Day with tulips of hope
While feast days are typically celebrated on a saint’s day of death, St. Marianne Cope’s feast day takes place on her birthday, Jan. 23. Cope was best known as a pioneer for hygiene practices, patient rights while helping open St. Joseph’s Health Hospital in 1869. Courtesy of Aaron Scibelli
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For Kristin Barrett-Anderson, honoring St. Marianne Cope is about practicing gratitude, supporting others and promoting unity. Barrett-Anderson, director of the Saint Marianne Cope Shrine & Museum, believes it’s vital to take time to support others.
Canonized as a saint on Oct. 21, 2012, Marianne was best known as a pioneer for hygiene practices, patient rights and mental health care. She helped open St. Joseph’s Health Hospital in 1869 and served as director for seven years before devoting the remainder of her life to aiding patients with leprosy in Hawaii.
In Catholicism, feast days celebrate saints, which typically take place on a saint’s day of death. However, Marianne’s feast day takes place on her birthday, Jan. 23.
“Because we’re in Syracuse, NY., it’s difficult to have a big celebration. You never know what the weather’s going to be,” Barrett-Anderson said. “So what we choose to do, which we think is much more appropriate, is celebrate Marianne by giving people easy ways of celebrating and appreciating others.”
On Friday, the museum organized their fourth annual celebration for Marianne’s feast day. The event is known as “tulip day;” visitors and hospital workers had the opportunity to give a flower to a patient at St. Joseph’s Health Hospital in honor of Marianne.
“Tulips are one of the first flowers to come up through the snow, and we just love that image of new beginnings, new growth,” Barrett-Anderson said. “So we see them as a symbol of hope.”
Rachelle Lando, who oversees language services and healing arts at the hospital, is no stranger to the tradition. As a member of the museum’s board, Lando said she was excited for the opportunity to spread Marianne’s values again. She described the feeling as “warm;” the tulips bring a positive atmosphere to the hospital, she said.
“Last year, we got a beautiful story of someone who was not in the best of sorts,” Barrett-Anderson said. “(A nurse) was able to gift him a tulip, and that was the first time she saw him smile.”
Patients were not the only people who were introduced to Marianne’s story. Gina Bradley, the hospital’s director of professional development, experienced the feast day for the first time this year.
People from all across the hospital share stories of how they’ve impacted their patients’ lives, Bradley said. She said she is hopeful the tulip tradition can continue on in future years.
“You can see it on people’s faces, the cheer it’s bringing,” Bradley said. “Just that alone speaks volumes about who we are at St. Joseph’s and what we do here.”
Lando said she was hopeful that everyone would be able to take a moment and feel a connection.
“It’s just a reminder of St. Marianne Cope’s qualities that she brings, and just the person who she is,” Lando said.
For Barrett-Anderson, the museum aims to teach its visitors to appreciate all individuals, celebrate differences and be present with each other.
The feast day culminates in one central question, Barrett-Anderson asked: What are the little things the hospital can do to make life a little brighter for every single person?
“This is the kind of stuff that really fills my cup, and it keeps me going, and spreading that recognition everywhere is what it’s all about,” Bradley said.
