By PHYLLIS ZORN

Staff writer

A chaplain’s helmet with a bullet hole near its cross will be given to the Father Kapaun Museum as part of St. John Nepomucene Church’s Nov. 11 Veterans Day observance.

Father Kapaun’s nephew, Ray Kapaun, will present the gift.

The helmet was given to Ray Kapaun by Moon Jae-in, president of South Korea, soon after Father Kapaun posthumously was awarded South Korea’s Order of Military Merit medal July 27, 2021.

The medal is the primary military decoration of the South Korean government and is given to a person who rendered outstanding services during war.

“The helmet shows that many gave their lives to defend the freedom of South Korea,” museum tour guide Harriet Bina said. “This helmet shows that many gave their lives to protect those freedoms and that even the chaplains were targeted during the Korean War.”

The church’s 11 a.m. mass will be conducted by Father Phillip Creider.

Creider, a former Navy chaplain who served all over the world, lives near Shawnee, Oklahoma, as a solitary religious contemplative.

After Mass and the presentation of the chaplain’s helmet, parishioners will lay a wreath at the Father Kapaun statue on the church grounds.

A luncheon at the church will raise money for the Altar Society.