An attack on a Catholic saint who died while ministering to lepers has been described as ‘outrageous’.

Damien of Molokai was a missionary from Belgium working in Hawaii when he volunteered to serve on a remote island for lepers in 1873, where he contracted the disease himself and died after 11 years.

He was honoured by the State of Hawaii in 1969 with a statue in Washington DC’s Capitol building.

But in an Instagram post to her 6 million followers last week, rising Democratic star, left-wing Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, called him a coloniser—and said the fact that he was honoured, instead of a woman of colour, was a sign of ‘the patriarchy’, and ‘white supremacy’.

Los Angeles Auxiliary Bishop, Robert Barron, however, said the critique of Damien was “crazy”, “outrageous”, “colossally misguided”, “ridiculous” and “insulting”.

He also referenced other recent attacks on churches, statues and heroes of the Christian faith in the US, as Christian Churches are getting engulfed in the rising tide of anger from the political left.

In a response posted to Facebook, he said critiques like those of Representative Ocasio-Cortez showed the poverty of woke politics. He called their categories of judgement “simplistic” as they fail to see the moral heroism of people like St Damien of Molokai.