U.S. military veterans attended St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church’s annual Veterans Day worship service in November 2023. Photo: Louis Deluca
[Episcopal News Service] St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church in Dallas, Texas, will host its annual livestreamed Veterans Day worship service on Sunday, Nov. 10, at 5:30 p.m. Central. The Rt. Rev. Ann Ritonia, bishop suffragan for The Episcopal Church’ armed forces and federal ministries, will preach.
“I’m grateful that St. Michael’s honors our veterans every year,” Ritonia, a U.S. Marine Corps veteran, told Episcopal News Service. “It’s good to support our veterans and our communities with a message.”
The bishop suffragan for armed forces and federal ministries is a member of the presiding bishop’s staff and is elected by the House of Bishops. In this role, Ritonia is responsible for recruiting, endorsing and supporting chaplains in the military, veterans’ hospitals and federal prisons. Currently, 64 Episcopal chaplains are serving in the military, according to Ritonia, who in September 2023 was ordained the first woman bishop suffragan in armed forces and federal ministries’ nearly 60-year history.
Veterans Day, also known as Armistice Day and Remembrance Day in other countries, is observed every Nov. 11. It was first observed in 1919 to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the signing of armistice between the Allied nations and Germany, marking the official end of World War I. The ceasefire officially took effect on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month local time in Compiègne, northern France, where the armistice was signed. In the United States, Armistice Day was renamed Veterans Day in 1954 to honor all veterans, both living and deceased.
As of 2023, 15.8 million veterans live in the United States, 1.7 million of whom are women, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The United States has 1.31 million active-duty military personnel as of 2024.
“Veterans Day is a day when we say, ‘Thank you for your service,’ which is a wonderful thing, but I would encourage people to engage further and be curious. Ask questions like, ‘What was your service like? What was meaningful about the work you did? How can we as a country support you now, given the sacrifices you made?’ Ritonia said.
“When we think of our faith, and we think of love and we think of gratitude, we respond with action. It’s by reaching out to those that are isolated, those that need food, those that are poor, those that are imprisoned, those with mental illness … God’s love is action.”
Ritonia said Episcopalians can support veterans in many ways, such as volunteering or donating money to their local VA hospitals and praying for veterans during worship services. She also mentioned the Diocese of Western Massachusetts’ Building Bridges community ministry that hosts regular lunches for veterans.
The Rev. Christopher G. Girata, rector of St. Michael’s and Ritonia’s classmate at Virginia Theological Seminary, told ENS that the church’s Veterans Day service annually attracts 400-600 members of the congregation and the wider community. He said he’s looking forward to learning about Ritonia’s work with active military personnel.
“It really is a big, fun event. It’s a celebration of the people who are remembered for their good service through the structure of a prayer service,” Girata said. “The Veterans Day service is an opportunity to recognize, celebrate, appreciate and love this unique group of people in our community.”
Stream the worship service live from St. Michael’s website or YouTube channel.
St. Michael’s one-hour Veterans Day service will start like a traditional evening prayer service with prayers, Scripture and hymns sung by the church’s choir, but the second half will be festive. A brass band from a local Veterans of Foreign Wars post will perform, concluding with the “Armed Forces Medley.” Veterans will be invited to stand and gather in front of the congregation when they hear their branch’s song. After the medley concludes, the veterans will take a group photo, and all are welcome to stay for a reception with snacks and desserts.
Girata said parishioners who are active-duty military personnel will also be included in the church’s Veterans Day worship service bulletin.
Ritonia will also preach at St. Michael’s middle and high school services earlier in the day. She will talk about her experience serving in the Marines. She will share how students can live a life of service and the vocational routes they can go through, such as Reserve Officers’ Training Corps programs and chaplaincy.
The next day, Ritonia will visit St. Michael Episcopal School, a preschool-kindergarten school connected to and operated by St. Michael and All Angels, where she will talk about acts of service with the children.
Girata said it’s possible to support the U.S. military as Christians without partisan politics.
“First, we are disciples of Jesus, and then we are American,” Girata said. “I think it becomes problematic when we begin to conflate the love of our neighbors with a burgeoning love of country, but it is possible to differentiate the two.”
Ritonia said the biggest misconception of the armed forces is the idea that military personnel are warmongers.
“We don’t welcome war; we prepare and train for it because the reality is we don’t live in a perfect world,” Ritonia said. “War is a terrible thing, and if we lived in a sinless and perfect world, we wouldn’t need trained military for protection. War will no longer exist when God’s kingdom comes to fruition, but we’re not there yet.”
Between spending long periods away from loved ones, risking permanent physical and mental injury and many other sacrifices, Ritonia said, serving in the military isn’t easy. Still, Ritonia said she has many positive memories from her time serving in the Marines, with her favorite coming from her time as an administrative officer supporting family members of deployed military personnel during Operation Desert Storm in 1991.
“It was incredibly rewarding to make sure that they had what they needed in order to thrive while their service person was deployed,” she said. “Service over self is the kind of life that I was able to live in in the military and develop relationships with people who wanted to do the same thing. …We wanted to make the world a better place and reflect God’s love, and my faith was a big part of that.”
-Shireen Korkzan is a reporter and assistant editor for Episcopal News Service. She can be reached at skorkzan@episcopalchurch.org.