There are many brave individuals, especially in battle.  There are many brave chaplains of all Faiths.  What was it that prompted only Catholic chaplains to perform such extraordinary deeds that they would receive the nation’s highest award for valor?

There was nothing unusual in the backgrounds of these five chaplains to foretell their actions.  They were common men, raised in much the same way as their peers.  Some were athletic, others were not.  Some were intellectual, others were pragmatic.  Some came from large families, others small.  Some were raised in working class environments, others were more privileged.

Like all chaplains, they did the routine duties of their branch.  In times of peace, they listened to gripes, served as a bridge between the men and their officers on missions of reconciliation, arranged coffee breaks, movies and entertainment to keep up the moral of the young troops, and served as psychologist and parent-in-absentia to the men.  They said Mass, heard confessions, and generally ministered to the men and their families.  In battle, all chaplains pray with and for those about to go into the fray, soothe the wounded, and minister to the dying.  Yet, when circumstances demanded extraordinary deeds, only Catholic chaplains went well beyond the norm.

I believe there are two elements unique to the Catholic priest that account for this.  First is the Eucharist.  Other religions may profess to have the Word of God as recorded in the Bible, the Torah, the Koran, or the Book of Mormon, but none has the true presence of Our Lord on earth.  Only the Catholic priest can transform bread and wine at Mass into the body and blood of Christ.  At the consecration, when the priest elevates the host after saying the words, “This is my body,” he is actually holding Christ aloft.  And similarly when he consecrates the wine and transforms it into the blood of Christ.  There is a physical presence here that cannot exist in any other religion.

The center of the Catholic Faith is the Eucharist.  The person who makes it the focus of his life develops an intimacy with Our Lord.  Christ is the model of pure, selfless, unconditional love, who was martyred on the cross for the salvation of mankind.  St. John described the reciprocity that this sacrifice calls for: “We know love by this, that Jesus Christ laid down his life for us – and we ought to lay down our lives for one another…let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action.”  (1Jn3:16-18)  Through the Eucharist the priest is strengthened spiritually so that he is able to reciprocate this love through a willingness to give his life for others.

The second element is the priest’s promise to lead a celibate, single life.  A person without obligations for a wife and children is freer to act than one who has concerns for the well-being of his family.  It is not just singleness, however, but celibacy which distinguishes the priest.  Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen speaks of celibacy as an offer of a gift from God, and likens it to a marriage proposal from a man to a woman.  The woman is free to accept or refuse the offer.

In accepting celibacy, the priest renounces sexual pleasures and presents to God a sacrifice that strengthens the bond between them.  It is a sign, as the Catechism of the Catholic Church (1579) states, that priests have accepted the call “to consecrate themselves with undivided heart to the Lord and to ‘the affairs of the Lord,’ [that] they give themselves entirely to God and to men.”  The priest thus can be more generous with his own life in the service of others.

Through the examples of these heroes, we can all be inspired to be heroic at least in small ways.  Archbishop Charles Chaput, in an article in First Things, gives us a prescription for how we can prepare ourselves for this role: “By talking to God, humbly and honestly, in prayer.  By getting to know Christ better through reading and praying over the gospels.  By opening yourself up to the graces he gives us in the sacraments.  It’s not about choosing what you want to do with your life.  It’s about discovering how God wants you to use your life to spread the good news of his love and his kingdom.”

We can all be heroes by obeying God in small ways as well as large, keeping his commandments, sacrificing for our families, assuming responsibility for our actions, making our way through life without complaint, and through a more frequent relationship with the Eucharist – at Mass, in Adoration, with frequent prayer.  We can be examples of what it means to be Catholic by what we say, what we do, and what we do not do.  We can show that God does indeed matter.  May we be inspired to stand before our secular world and live our lives by heeding the familiar prayer, “Thy will be done.”

With the rapid growth in troop size, the number of chaplains to minister to these troops was woefully inadequate.  The Church hierarchy knew of only eight Catholic chaplains in the entire army.  The Knights of Columbus previously had established centers on domestic military posts to provide recreational and spiritual activities for the troops.  Now they obtained permission from General Pershing, commander of the American Expeditionary Force, to provide Catholic priests to serve as volunteer, civilian chaplains.

Fr. John B. DeValles was one of the first five priests to leave for France as a Knights of Columbus chaplain, arriving in September with the first National Guard units.  These doughboys, newly mobilized and inexperienced, received several months of training in methods of trench warfare, procedures for gas attacks, and the techniques of using grenades and bayonets.  Now, as spring approached, they were ready to gain front-line experience.  The Americans would relieve French units in areas that were relatively quiet.

Fr. DeValles was attached to the 104th Regiment of the 26th Division, known as the Yankee Division, which was composed of National Guard units from throughout New England.  The chaplain quickly exhibited his concern for the men and his courage.  On March 11, 1918, while still in a reserve capacity, his unit came under heavy shelling.  Fr. DeValles choose to remain with the wounded when they could not be moved to a safe area.

In April, the 104th Regiment was replacing a veteran French unit in the Bois Brule, near the village of Apremont.  Another French unit remained on its left.  The terrain was rugged, the trenches assigned to the Americans were in poor condition, and the land marshy making drainage difficult.  In the distance, Mont Sec gave the enemy a splendid vantage point to observe the U.S. area.

On April 5, and continuing for five days, there was heavy shelling of the American position.  Then, in the predawn hours of April 10, the bombardment intensified.  With first light, the enemy came over a hillcrest in a relentless assault.  The U.S. troops, forgetting much of their newly-learned techniques, battled fiercely, repelling the veteran German soldiers.  On the night of the 11th, the Americans checked another attack.  The following day, the enemy came again.  The French pulled back, exposing the U.S. left flank, but a vigorous counterattack by the Americas regained the ground the enemy had taken.  Fighting continued sporadically on the 13th, and then stopped.

For four days, Fr. DeValles virtually lived in “No Man’s Land,” an area pitted with shell holes and strewn with barbed wire, broken trees and other war-torn detritus.  Ignoring shelling and machine-gun fire, he comforted the wounded, helped carry those who could not walk to aid stations and ministered to the dying, making no distinction between friendly and enemy soldiers.  He was indefatigable.  When his hands were numb and could no longer grip the handles of a stretcher, he tied telephone wire around his wrists and looped the ends over the bars.

Several days after the battle, the French awarded the 104th Regiment the Croix de Guerre for its bravery and achievements.  This was the first such award to an American unit.  Fr. DeValles received the same award, being citied for his “extraordinary heroism and exceptional devotion to duty, under uninterrupted fire and the constant risk of his life.”  He became known as the Angel of the Trenches because of his zeal and charity in caring for the injured and dying.

For the remainder of the year, the Division took part in major offenses at Aisne-Marne, St. Mihiel, and the Meuse-Argonne.  Fr. DeValles remained on the frontlines.  At one point, outside of his dugout in a trench, he placed a handmade sign that read, “Fr. John’s Office,” indicating that he was always available to the men.  In July 1918, his request was approved and Fr. DeValles was appointed a chaplain in the regular army with the rank of 1st lieutenant.

After one engagement, he was found unconscious and wounded, lying next to a dead soldier he had been trying to help.  He was to be sent home, but refused and insisted on being treated in France so that he could be near his men.  When partially recovered, he returned to the regiment.  Several months after the fighting ended with the Armistice on November 11, 1918, Fr. DeValles sailed for America with his unit.

A series of stateside assignments followed, until he was operated on for a malignant tumor in January 1920.  On May 12, thirty minutes before his death, he was told that he was to receive the Distinguished Service Cross.  Major General Clarence Edwards, former commander of the Yankee Division, pinned the medal on him at his funeral.  The general stated that Father DeValles’ “bravery was unsurpassed by that of any man fighting under the American colors in France.”

Joao Baptista DeValles was born in 1878 at San Miguel, Azores, and emigrated to New Bedford, Massachusetts, at the age of two.  After college, he entered the seminary and in 1906 was ordained a priest for the Fall River Diocese.  With knowledge of six languages, he served in several parishes, including Espirito Santo, where he established the first parochial school in America for Portuguese students.  Then, with his bishop’s permission, he volunteered as a Knights of Columbus chaplain, when the U.S. entered World War I.  His medals -- French Croix de Guerre, Legion of Honor and American Distinguished Service Cross – and uniform reside today in the Order’s museum in New Haven.