STATEN ISLAND — Servant of God Father Vincent Capodanno, a U.S. Navy chaplain who served side-by-side with the “grunts” in the Vietnam War, once described his philosophy of service to his cousin, Al Lambert, during a conversation the two had in the 1960s.
“I go where the need is. I don’t care about the politics of the war. Men are dying. That’s where I belong,” Lambert quoted his cousin as saying.
On Sept. 4, the 59th anniversary of Father Capodanno’s death, Lambert was one of the speakers at a prayer service held on Staten Island in his cousin’s memory.
Father Capodanno (1929-1967), a Maryknoll missionary and native of Staten Island, was shot to death by snipers while assisting a wounded Marine in Vietnam.
The Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA, opened a cause for his canonization in 2006, and he was declared a servant of God.
The prayer service, which drew members of veterans’ organizations and members of the Knights of Columbus, was celebrated in front of a statue of Father Capodanno that stands at the intersection of Father Capodanno Boulevard and Seaview Avenue in the Ocean Breeze neighborhood of Staten Island.
The eight-foot-tall bronze statue, depicting Father Capodanno clutching rosary beads and looking with compassion at a frightened young girl holding onto his leg, was designed by artist Gregory Perillo and dedicated in December 2025.
Local veterans, led by Anthony Leto, a Vietnam-era veteran, raised $91,000 to commission the statue.
Veterans look up to Father Capodanno and worked to get the statue built because of his courage and his commitment to the grunts and to the civilian population caught in the horror of war, Leto said.
“Not only did he do prayers over the marines and give them Last Rites, but he would also go into the villages,” he explained. “That’s why the statue has a little girl grabbing his pants leg. He always helped the children.”
Vincent Capodanno was born the youngest of 10 children on Feb. 13, 1929. He decided to become a Maryknoll missionary and was ordained a priest in 1958. He was sent to serve as a missionary in Taiwan. In the early 1960s, he expressed interest in becoming a military chaplain. Lambert recalled driving Vincent to and from the chaplaincy school on Fort Hamilton Army Base in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.
“I took him every morning, and I would pick him up at eight o’clock. And I picked hm up every afternoon at 4 o’clock,” Lambert said, joking that it was the only way he could keep his cousin from commandeering his car. “I gave him my car for four days, and he had it for three weeks!” he said.
Lambert is among those advocating for Father Capodanno’s canonization.
Father Capodanno was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Navy on Dec. 28, 1965, and was sent to Vietnam in April of 1966.
Vincent Maligno, a member of the Vietnam Veterans of America and a speaker at the prayer service, said Father Capodanno willingly chose to put his life on the line.
“To be a military chaplain, he could have gone into any service. He chose to be a Navy chaplain. To be a Navy chaplain, he could have gone anywhere where the Navy was. He chose the Marines. To choose the Marines, he could have gone anywhere the Marines were. He chose Vietnam,” said Maligno, who is also a member of the Knights of Columbus Father Vincent Capodanno Council.
On Labor Day, Sept. 4, 1967, he raced to the battlefield when he heard that a Marine unit was taking heavy casualties. He was shot and killed while tending to a wounded Marine. His remains were brought back to the U.S., and he was interred at St. Peter’s Cemetery on Staten Island.
In 1969, President Richard Nixon posthumously bestowed the Medal of Honor on Father Capodanno. The citation from the Medal of Honor ceremony was read aloud at the prayer service.
Father Capodanno’s legacy will live on, Leto said.
“He deserves to be remembered for being a Maryknoll priest and bringing the word of God to people in wartime,” he said.