Howard lived mainly during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I; he was charged with being a Roman Catholic, quitting England without leave, and sharing in Jesuit plots.

He was baptised by the Lord Chancellor and Archbishop of York Nicholas Heath at Whitehall Palace with the royal family in attendance, and was named after his co-godfather, King Philip II of Spain, husband of the ruling monarch, Mary I.

Philip's half-brothers Thomas and William, sons of their father by his second wife Margaret Audley, subsequently married Anne's sisters Mary and Elizabeth respectively.

After his father's death, Philip and his surviving half-siblings Thomas, Margaret and William were left in the care of their uncle, Henry Howard, who also took charge of their education.

Due to his father's execution, Philip lost much of his paternal family's estates and the title of Earl of Surrey, as the dukedom of Norfolk was forfeit.

Howard was present at a debate in the Tower of London in 1581 between a group of Protestant theologians and the Catholic priests Edmund Campion and Ralph Sherwin.

That same year, the Countess of Arundel, without her husband's knowledge and in great fear of his displeasure, secretly returned to the illegal and underground Catholic Church in England.

[12] Arundel, while still attending Elizabeth's court, successfully hid his adherence to Catholicism for a time,[13] before withdrawing to his home and attempting to focus on being a better husband and father.

The next year, Howard acted against Father Weston's cautions,[14] by attempting to flee to mainland Europe in order to live openly as a Catholic with his wife and children.

[18][1] He was charged before the Star Chamber with being a Catholic, quitting England without leave, sharing in Jesuit plots, and claiming the title Duke of Norfolk in defiance of his father's attainder.

[20] In a letter dated 1 May 1589 to Claudio Aquaviva, Father Henry Garnet recalled, "When the sentence was pronounced and the crowd saw the Earl coming out of the hall with the axe-edge turned in towards him -- in the trial of nobles this is the sign that the prisoner has been condemned -- suddenly there was a great uproar that was carried miles along the river bank, some people demanding what had come of the Queen's clemency that such a splendid and gallant gentleman should suffer condemnation, others passionately indignant that a man who had prayed to God should be executed for that alone.

For among the accusations brought against him, the principal charge and the one on which the whole case turned, was this -- he had asked a certain priest to pray for the success of the Spanish fleet; whereas in fact, all his enemies could prove against him and all he had done was this, that he sought that prayers should be said every day and night in the Tower of London and in other prisons at that time, chiefly, when everyone was expecting a general massacre [of Catholics].

[18] He was kept constantly in fear of execution, although comforted by the companionship of a dog, which served as a go-between by which Howard and other prisoners, most notably the priest Robert Southwell, could smuggle messages to each other.

Father Weston later recalled, "While he was enduring these cruel sufferings an offer of liberation was made him in the Queen's name, but on condition that he held a disputation with the so-called Archbishop of Canterbury.

[25] Howard was buried beneath the floor of the church of St Peter ad Vincula, inside the walls of the Tower, where his father's remains also lay.

[26] The Dowager Countess died of natural causes on 19 April 1630 at Shifnal Manor, Shropshire aged 73, and was buried next to her husband inside the Fitzalan Chapel.

It was elevated to the status of a cathedral in 1965 and its dedication changed to Our Lady and Saint Philip Howard just after Pope Paul VI canonised the Earl as one of the Forty Martyrs of England and Wales in October 1970.

On 10 March 1971 in the presence of Monsignor Michael Bowen, then Coadjutor bishop of Arundel and Brighton, and the Chapter of Canons, Howard's remains were moved from the Fitzalan Chapel to the new shrine erected in the cathedral, where the consecration ceremony was held.

[30] For example, the Earl made a Latin-Elizabethan English translation of An Epistle in the Person of Jesus Christ to the Faithful Soule by John Justus of Landsberg, which was posthumously published at Antwerp (1595, reprinted 1871).

Howard's verse translation of Marko Marulić's poem Carmen de doctrina Domini nostri Iesu Christi pendentis in cruce ("A Dialogue Betwixt a Christian and Christ Hanging on the Crosse"), served in lieu of an introduction in the Antwerp edition.

[31] Howard's poetry translation of Marulić was published again, with updated English orthography, in the March/April 2022 issue of the Traditionalist Catholic literary magazine, St. Austin Review.