Jesus Christ tells us in John 15:13 that "No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends." In World War Two, Father Joseph Verbis Lafleur (1912-1944) of Ville Platte, LA, a chaplain lieutenant in the U.S. Army Air Corps, lived out the meaning of that message. He died on a Japanese prisoner-of-war transport ship mistakenly torpedoed by a U.S. submarine off the coast of the Philippines, ignoring his own safety to aid wounded fellow American POWs, give absolution to the dying, and help those he could escape through an open hatch to freedom, even as their captors opened fire. On Sept. 5, 2020, Bishop J. Douglas Deshotel of Lafayette officially opened Father Lafleur's Cause for Canonization. In this edition of Catholic Military Life, the only official podcast of the Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA, Father Mark Ledoux, the Episcopal Delegate for the Cause, shares the chaplain hero's remarkable story and how Father Lafleur, who posthumously received a Purple Heart, a Bronze Star, and two Distinguished Service Crosses for his bravery, is now on track to become a saint.
