On Sept. 4, 1967, during fierce combat on a knoll during the Vietnam War, U.S. Marines were greatly outnumbered by the Vietnamese. Amid the fight, it took more than 25 enemy bullets to stop the severely wounded Navy chaplain Lt. Vincent Capodanno as he moved about the field bringing comfort, ministering to the dying, and rescuing the wounded of “Mike” Company’s 1st, 2nd and 3rd platoons.

Today, with his canonization cause open, Servant of God Father Vincent Capodanno’s heroic and virtuous life is remembered every Sept. 4 with a memorial Mass in the Crypt Church of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C. Archbishop Timothy Broglio of the Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA, will celebrate this annual Mass, which EWTN will broadcast live on Wednesday, Sept. 4, at 6:30 p.m. Eastern.

The day before, Tuesday, Sept. 3, at 10:30 a.m. (Eastern time), EWTN will also rebroadcast the film Called and Chosen: Father Vincent R. Capodanno, recalling the life of this Maryknoll priest and Navy chaplain who received a posthumous Medal of Honor when he gave his life for young Marines in Que Son Valley, Vietnam, 57 years ago. The film highlights his life, his holiness and his dedication to not only the Marine Corps but to all those he served — and even the holiness of growing up Catholic and being a daily communicant.

Vivid Memories

Linda Capodanno Sargent, Father Capodanno’s niece, and her husband Edward will, as usual, be attending the Mass.

“I think when people come to the Mass, they come to immerse themselves again in Father Capodanno’s holiness,” she told the Register. “That’s what the Mass means to me — and to take away the things that we can learn from his life.”

She added, “When he died, there were so many Marines and their families who wrote and came to his funeral. Thousands of people wrote about what he meant to them in their lives and their sons’ lives at the time in Vietnam, and what comfort he brought to them and how he shared God with them in very difficult times. A lot of those people have passed on, and we hope that we can sustain that understanding of what Father was to people.”

She has her own strong, loving memories of her uncle, whom she came to know after Father Capodanno’s brother Albert married her widowed mother and adopted Linda and her five siblings. “We were warmly embraced by Father Capodanno’s family,” she said.

Sargent met uncle Vincent, who was at the time a Maryknoll missionary in Taiwan, when he came back to the States and before he entered the Naval training program and chaplaincy.

“He would come home and travel around to different siblings and their families,” Sargent said. “And he stayed with us many times when he was home. It was so special, the feeling of having him home and to have a priest in the family and the way he related to everyone.”

Sargent recalls how, “when he came into a room, there was something about him. He was very modest. And he drew you to him. He focused on you, on each of us kids. He would ask us what we were doing in school and what we liked and talked to us about saying our prayers. You just felt honestly like you were the only person there. He had this certain way about him. And I came to think of it as a holiness.”

She added, “When Father Vincent was home, everyone got together. Everyone wanted to be with him. It was really amazing.”

Both as a niece and as a board member of the Father Capodanno Guild, she hopes the Mass will keep him in the forefront of people’s thoughts and prayers.

“Father Vincent could talk to us kids when we were young about what we were doing, and he had traveled and done things that a lot of our family had never done,” she added. “He was on top of things out there. Then he brought his spirituality to that in a way that you could relate to. So I hope people can take away from the Mass an understanding of Father Vincent’s life and how they could relate to that, how he can relate to your life. That’s important.”

Momentous Purpose

Also at the Mass will be retired Vice Adm. P. Stephen Stanley and his wife Jean. As chairman of the Father Capodanno Guild, he spoke with the Register about the witness of the Servant of God’s life. 

“It’s exciting for me to go and be present again,” he said of the Mass. “We in the Capodanno Guild are all supporters of his cause for canonization because we think his soul is in heaven in communion with God the Father. But to offer this Mass for the repose of his soul is very important. It’s a way for us here on earth to be part of this cause, to understand where it’s going. Archbishop Broglio is an excellent homilist, and he will bring out all these different factors. So it’s a great event, and it’s certainly important to offer that Mass for the repose of Father Vincent’s soul.”

According to a “Father Vincent Capodanno Newsletter” this year, the cause documentation is being completed, including sending answers to some questions posed by the theological consultants from the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints in Rome.

Adm. Stanley explained the importance of Father Capodanno’s canonization cause by picturing the Medal of Honor recipients in a vivid way.

“He’s a recipient of the Medal of Honor. Forty million people have served in our military over the years — 40 million. Roughly, just over 3,500 Medals of Honor have been received by those individuals. … It tells you that’s why it’s our nation’s highest award for heroism on the battlefield.”

“It’s even more than that,” he continued. “Of those just over 3,500 Medals of Honor, only nine have been awarded to military chaplains. And in that group of military chaplains, four were awarded to Protestant chaplains during the Civil War. Since the Civil War, the other five medals of honor that have been received by chaplains have all gone to Catholic priest chaplains. Of those five Catholic military chaplains who have received the Medal of Honor, two have ongoing causes for canonization. Father Vincent is one of those. There’s also Father Emil Kapaun, who died as a prisoner of war in North Korea during the Korean conflict.”

“I’ve been incredibly blessed in my life,” he added. “I’ve got four daughters, and we have 17 grandkids. I would love to have Father Vincent — and Father Kapaun — canonized so that our family can venerate such an amazing man. This is about having somebody to imitate and venerate. I can’t think of a better soul to imitate and venerate than one of those two chaplains.”