Cardinal Francis George has died of cancer at the age of 78.

Cardinal Francis George lost his nine-year battle with cancer on April 17. He was an American cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church and Archbishop Emeritus of Chicago. In his honor, officials planned a special prayer service for Friday evening at St. Pascal Catholic Church in Chicago's Portage Park neighborhood, where he went to college and was ordained.

Gene Kummerer, a parishioner who interviewed Cardinal Francis George at an event the church held to celebrate its centennial in 2014, said of him, "He's almost certainly the greatest overachiever this neighborhood's created," according to StatesmenNews.

Cardinal Francis George will be buried in the George family plot located at All Saints Cemetery and Mausoleum in suburban Des Plaines, where his parents, Francis J. and Julia R. George were put to rest.

It all started at St. Pascal's where young Francis began what became a life devoted to the Catholic Church and serving others.

St. Pascal Pastor Rafal Stecz fondly remembers meeting the cardinal when he came to Chicago from Poland as a seminary student a few years ago. Stecz said that for him, Cardinal Francis George is a hero and that's how he will remember him, CBSChicago noted.

Stecz recalls introducing himself to Cardinal Francis George saying "My name is Rafal," but to his surprise, the cardinal replied, "I know."

"It shows he was very interested in us," Stecz said.

That said, the cardinal's love of his boyhood parish was not just restricted to its members. A brick in the courtyard of the rectory conveys the pride his parish had in him.

The brick reads: "Saint Pascal's favorite son, Francis Cardinal George, Celebrating 50 Years of Priesthood 1963-2013."

During Friday's morning Mass, Stecz asked the parish to pray for the sick, especially Cardinal Francis George, but he was not aware that would be the last prayer that he would offer to God for the cardinal.

Stecz noted that the cardinal left the world a valuable lesson. Despite his sickness, if the cardinal could continue, we can continue, too, and we should.

Catholic parishes throughout the Chicago area, as well as the suburbs, halted school and called it a day at offices, as the word spread of Cardinal Francis George's death.

The cardinal died Friday morning at his property.