Army chaplain Emil J. Kapaun was born in Pilsen, Kansas, in the Diocese of Wichita, on Holy Thursday, April 20, 1916. Ordained a diocesan priest, he entered the U.S. Army Chaplain Corps in 1944. He was sent to Japan in 1948 and to Korea in July 1950.

Four months later, on Nov. 2, he was captured by the enemy when he refused an order to try to escape after the 8th Cavalry was overwhelmed. Father Kapaun was seized administering the last rites to a dying soldier.

For seven months in a prisoner of war camp in Pyoktong, North Korea, run by the Chinese, Father Kapaun served his fellow prisoners, nursing the sick and wounded, stealing and preparing food for them, washing their dysentery-fouled clothes, burying the dead, confronting the Communist propaganda, and conducting prayer services.

Eventually he grew ill until a blood clot in his leg prevented his daily rounds. Moved to a hospital, but denied medications, he died on May 23, 1951. He was buried outside the camp in an unmarked grave. He was 35 and a priest for 11 years.

His fellow prisoners — Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, agnostic — have all attested to his sanctity. The Diocese of Wichita has opened the cause for Father Kapaun’s canonization.