Celebrating our Veterans: Chaplain Ted Howden: Priest+Soldier+Martyr

This Veterans Day we give thanks for all of those who have served valiantly in defense of our country.

For Heroic Service

O Judge of the nations, we remember before you with grateful hearts the men and women of our country who in the day of decision ventured much for the liberties we now enjoy. Grant that we may not rest until all the people of this land share the benefits of true freedom and gladly accept its disciplines. This we ask in the Name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

The Cathedral of St. John will again be hosting a Diocesan Service honoring our Local Saint and Martyr, Chaplain Ted Howden this December 11th at 7pm. Links to come.

The Rev. Frederick B. "Ted" Howden Jr.

Priest + Soldier + Martyr

+ died December 11, 1942 +

Collect

Almighty God our strength and sustenance, you gave your servant Frederick Howden the grace and courage to put the need and hunger of others before his own life and health. Inspire us with directness of purpose in the training of body, mind, and spirit that we may better serve you, our country, and our others. Give us the vision to know what is right and the courage to pursue it. Strengthen us with your Spirit for the duties of life before us, that we may continue your faithful servants to our life’s end, and at the last enter into your heavenly kingdom: through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Propers

Preface of a Saint (2)

Isaiah 40:25-31

Psalm 18: 1-6, 18-20

Matthew 25:34-40

Download Fr. Howden's biography

Father Ted Howden with his father Bishop Howden at the church he founded, St. Anne's Chapel, Glencoe, in Lincoln County. (c.1934)

Be Home Soon: Letters from My Grandfather

"A documentary about war and faith, love and loss, family myth and legacy - based on letters from my grandfather a man I never knew." - Created by Melissa Howden

click to view

Read what Melissa Howden wrote of her work for Together

Once produced, copies of the documentary were purchased by Bishop Vono and a copy of the DVD was given to each congregation in the Diocese for its library.

Adding Chaplain Ted Howden

to Lesser Feasts and Fasts

The 2018 General Convention of the Episcopal Church considered resolutions from the Diocese of the Rio Grande, the Deputation of the Diocese of the Rio Grande and the Bishop of the Diocese of the Rio Grande to designate December 11 to honor Bataan Martyr and Chaplain the Rev’d Frederick B. “Ted” Howden Jr. and add his name to Lesser Feasts and Fasts. The resolutions were forwarded to the Standing Committee on Liturgy and Music for consideration. The resolutions were supported by the former and current Bishops of the Armed Forces and Federal Ministries as well as other Deputations, Dioceses and Bishops.

The Standing Committee on Liturgy and Music previously was asked to consider Chaplain Howden, who died on December 11, 1942, of starvation in the camps that imprisoned the survivors of the Bataan death march. A former member of the SCLM, who subsequently served in a congregation in the Rio Grande, noted that Howden was rejected because he was “just another white soldier.” Although his ethnic heritage was Anglo, the vast majority of the men for whom he served as chaplain were of Hispanic, Native American and Mexican heritage.

They were members of the 200^th Coast Artillery, a volunteer unit of the New Mexico State Guard that was federalized in 1941 to provide the reinforcements requested by General Douglas MacArthur to fortify the Philippines for the war he anticipated. The 200^th was “a cross-section of New Mexico” made up of “Professors, students, miners, lumberjacks, cowboys, rodeo performers, sheepherders, farmers, bus drivers. We had Navajos, Pueblos, Apaches, Zunis.” They came together. “Whatever their origin, they felt more ‘one’ than ‘other’. … we were amigos.”[1]

Chaplain Howden served the men of the 200^th from the time of his enlistment as Chaplain in 1938, through their training and deployment, sustained them through the ninety-day siege of Bataan, and cared for the sick and the dying until his own death of starvation-induced pellagra and dysentery on December 11, 1942. To honor Chaplain Howden is also to honor those for whom he gave his life by sharing his sparse rations with men with families “who needed them more.”

Chaplain Howden was celebrated for many years in his home congregation of St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, Roswell, New Mexico. In 2000 the Annual Diocesan Convention established December 11 to commemorate Fr. Howden in the liturgical calendar of the Diocese of the Rio Grande. In 2012 Bishop Michael Vono instituted the first diocesan-wide observance of Fr. Howden’s feast day with services in each of the four deaneries on December 11. Diocesan observances have occurred each year since 2012.

In 2008, the Diocesan Convention resolved to present the name of the Rev. Frederick B. “Ted” Howden to the Standing Liturgical Commission of the Episcopal Church so that his life and work could be commemorated annually on December 11 through the liturgical calendar of the Church. Diocesan Resolutions were approved and forwarded to the General Conventions of 2012, 2015 and 2018.

The Observances

Although the death of Father Ted Howden has been observed for some time in congregations, particularly in his home parish of St. Andrew's, Roswell, Bishop Michael Vono in 2012 inaugurated a Diocesan-wide observance of December 11 as a Feast Day at the urging of Fr. Tom Gray, who was rector of Grace Episcopal Church, Carlsbad. This observance has continued under the Episcopacy of Bishop Michael Buerkel Hunn.

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic the 2020 Observance is planned as a Virtual event from the Cathedral of St. John, Albuquerque.

The images below may be downloaded