He paddled a canoe to Honolulu to be personally instructed in the faith and to join the church.
At the time Catholics experienced discrimination at the hands of the Protestant majority.
The Catholics in Wailuku were ordered by the government to build a Protestant church but they refused.
[2] His boundless enthusiasm for the promotion of the Catholic faith earned him the title "Apostle of Maui".
Before the Catholic Mission was properly established in Maui, Koa'eloa died in 1848 and was buried in Wailua, the valley of his birth.