Feast Day: 1 May (Traditional Roman Calendar) — though in some places kept on 11 May owing to the precedence of St. Joseph the Worker
I. Sanctus Philippus Apostolus
Origins and Calling
Saint Philip was a native of Bethsaida in Galilee, the same town that gave the Church Saints Peter and Andrew. The Holy Gospel according to St. John records his calling with a singular tenderness: “On the following day, he would go forth into Galilee, and he findeth Philip. And Jesus saith to him: Follow me” (St. John i, 43, Douay-Rheims). He is among the very first whom Our Lord summoned by name, and his response was immediate and ardent.
Scarcely had he received the divine call when Philip became himself an apostle of the Apostle, drawing his friend Nathanael (whom tradition identifies with St. Bartholomew) to Christ with the now-celebrated words: “We have found him of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets did write, Jesus the son of Joseph of Nazareth” (St. John i, 45). When Nathanael objected, “Can any thing of good come from Nazareth?” Philip answered with the simplicity that marks the true evangelist: “Come and see.”
In the Gospel Narrative
The Sacred Scripture preserves four distinct moments wherein Philip appears:
He is questioned by Our Lord before the multiplication of the loaves — “Whence shall we buy bread, that these may eat?” — which St. John specifies was said “to try him; for he himself knew what he would do” (St. John vi, 5-6). Philip’s calculating response, that two hundred pennyworth of bread would not suffice, reveals the gentle pedagogy of Christ, who would soon shame all such human reckoning by His miracle.
He is approached by certain Greeks who desired to see Jesus, and he brings their request through St. Andrew to the Master (St. John xii, 20-22).
Most movingly, at the Last Supper, he made the petition that has echoed through every contemplative soul since: “Lord, shew us the Father, and it is enough for us.” To which Our Lord gave that sublime reply: “Have I been so long a time with you; and have you not known me? Philip, he that seeth me seeth the Father also” (St. John xiv, 8-9). St. Augustine, commenting on this passage in his Tractates on the Gospel of John, observes that Philip’s longing was holy, but his understanding still imperfect — he sought the Father as though He were separable from the Son, not yet having grasped the consubstantial unity of the Divine Persons.
He is named in the upper room with the other Apostles after the Ascension (Acts i, 13). (He must be carefully distinguished from Philip the Deacon, one of the Seven, whose deeds are recorded in Acts viii.)
Apostolic Labors and Martyrdom
According to the venerable tradition preserved by Eusebius (citing Polycrates of Ephesus in his Ecclesiastical History, Bk. III, ch. 31, and Bk. V, ch. 24), St. Philip preached the Gospel in Phrygia, in the region of Asia Minor, and was buried at Hierapolis together with his daughters who lived in virginity and prophecy. The Roman Martyrology and the lessons of the Breviarium Romanum recount that he labored long among the Scythians and the Phrygians, drawing many from idolatry to the worship of the true God.
At the city of Hierapolis, having confounded the pagan priests who worshipped a great serpent, he was seized in his old age — being then some eighty-seven years — and, in imitation of his Master, crucified. Some accounts add that he was scourged and stoned upon the cross. Thus he completed his apostolate by the same instrument upon which the Lamb of God was offered.
II. Sanctus Iacobus Apostolus, Frater Domini
This is James the Less, called also James the Just and the Brother of the Lord, son of Alphaeus (whom tradition often identifies with Cleophas), and according to the most ancient tradition, kinsman of Our Lord according to the flesh — “frater Domini” in the Hebraic usage which encompasses cousins and near relations. He must not be confused with St. James the Greater, son of Zebedee, who was beheaded by Herod.
Sanctity of Life
Hegesippus, the second-century chronicler whose testimony is preserved by Eusebius (Hist. Eccl., Bk. II, ch. 23), gives a portrait of St. James so resplendent that the Church has scarcely added to it:
He was holy from his mother’s womb. He drank no wine nor strong drink, nor did he eat flesh. No razor came upon his head; he anointed not himself with oil, nor used the bath. To him alone was it permitted to enter the Holy of Holies, for he wore not woolen but linen garments. And alone he entered into the Temple, and was found upon his knees beseeching forgiveness for the people, so that his knees became hard like a camel’s, by reason of his constant kneeling in worship of God and entreating forgiveness for the people.
For this cause was he surnamed the Just (ho Dikaios) and Oblias, which signifieth Bulwark of the People.
First Bishop of Jerusalem
He was constituted by the Apostles the first Bishop of the See of Jerusalem — the Mother Church of Christendom — and presided there with singular authority. At the Council of Jerusalem (Acts xv), the first ecumenical gathering of the Church, after Sts. Peter and Paul had spoken, it was James who, in his episcopal authority over that see, pronounced the sentence: “For which cause I judge that they, who from among the Gentiles are converted to God, are not to be disquieted” (Acts xv, 19).
The Epistle
To him the Holy Ghost vouchsafed to inspire the Catholic Epistle of St. James, that brief but searching letter directed to the twelve tribes scattered abroad. Therein he sets forth the doctrine that “faith without works is dead” (Iac. ii, 26) — a teaching which the Council of Trent (Sess. VI, De Iustificatione) defended against the novelties of the Protestant revolutionaries, affirming that justification, though gratuitously begun by grace, is increased through the cooperation of the will in good works.
It is also in this epistle that we find the scriptural foundation for the Sacrament of Extreme Unction: “Is any man sick among you? Let him bring in the priests of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith shall save the sick man, and the Lord shall raise him up: and if he be in sins, they shall be forgiven him” (Iac. v, 14-15). The Council of Trent (Sess. XIV, De Extrema Unctione) declared this passage to be a true promulgation of the sacrament instituted by Christ.
Martyrdom
About the year of Our Lord 62, during the high priesthood of Ananus the Younger, in the interregnum between the procurators Festus and Albinus, the scribes and Pharisees, enraged at the multitudes whom James was converting to Christ, brought him to the pinnacle of the Temple and bade him deny the Lord Jesus before the assembled people at the Passover.
But the holy bishop, with a voice like thunder, proclaimed: “Why do you ask me concerning Jesus the Son of Man? He sitteth in heaven at the right hand of the great Power, and shall come upon the clouds of heaven.” Hearing this confession, his persecutors hurled him from the height. Yet he was not killed, but rising upon his bruised knees prayed for his murderers, saying after the manner of his Lord and of Stephen: “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Then, while still he prayed, a fuller smote him upon the head with the club used for beating cloth, and so he gave up his soul to God.
The aged Symeon, son of Cleophas, succeeded him as the second Bishop of Jerusalem.
III. Why These Two Are Joined
The Holy Roman Church joins their feast because their sacred relics were translated together to Rome in the sixth century and laid in the Basilica of the Holy Apostles, which Pope Pelagius I began and Pope John III completed and consecrated in their honor (anno Domini 561). This basilica, the Basilica Santi XII Apostoli, remains one of the great stational churches of the Eternal City. Thus the Church on earth keeps their memory united, as their souls are united in the beatific vision of God.
IV. Lessons for Imitation
From St. Philip we learn the simplicity of evangelization: “Come and see.” He did not argue Nathanael into faith but brought him to encounter the Person of Christ. He also teaches us the holy boldness of asking God for the deepest things, even when our understanding falters: “Shew us the Father.”
From St. James the Just we learn that the apostolic ministry is grounded in penance, prayer, and mortification. His knees, hardened from intercession, are an icon of priestly and episcopal life as the Tradition has always understood it. He teaches us that orthodoxy of belief must be wedded to orthopraxy — faith made vital and visible in works of charity, in care for the widow and the orphan, in bridling the tongue, in patience under trial.
V. Collecta from the Traditional Missal
Deus, qui nos annua Apostolorum tuorum Philippi et Iacobi solemnitate laetificas: praesta, quaesumus; ut, quorum gaudemus meritis, instruamur exemplis. Per Dominum nostrum Iesum Christum…
O God, who dost gladden us by the yearly festival of Thine Apostles Philip and James: grant, we beseech Thee, that, as we rejoice in their merits, so we may be instructed by their example. Through Our Lord Jesus Christ…
VI. A Practical Application
Consider, in your own examination of conscience this evening, how you stand with respect to these two patrons. With St. Philip: have you brought a single soul this year to “come and see” Christ? With St. James: are your knees acquainted with the floor of your oratory? The Apostles converted the world not chiefly by arguments, but by sanctity poured out in prayer and martyrdom.
A worthy devotion this day is the recitation of the Litany of the Saints, lingering upon the invocation “Omnes sancti Apostoli et Evangelistae, orate pro nobis,” and offering a decade of the Rosary — perhaps the Fourth Glorious, the Assumption — for the conversion of one soul known to you who has fallen away from the Faith.
If you wish to deepen this study, the Lives of the Saints learning path will conduct you through the apostolic college man by man, and thence into the age of the martyrs and the Fathers. Alternatively, the Theology and Doctrine path can take up the questions raised by St. James’s Epistle concerning faith, works, and justification, where the wisdom of the Council of Trent shines forth against the errors of the sixteenth century.
Sancti Philippe et Iacobe, orate pro nobis.