The Apostle James who we honour today
is the son of Zebedee and Salome, the brother of Saint John the
Evangelist, called with him to follow Jesus. He is known as James the
Greater, to distinguish him from his fellow Apostle, James the Lesser
(or James the Just), the son of Alphaeus and cousin of Jesus who
wrote the canonical Epistle. James the Greater was one of the first
to be called to the Apostolate together with his brother and, leaving
his father and his nets, he followed the Lord. Jesus called them both
Boanerges, that is, sons of Thunder. He was one of the three Apostles
whom our Saviour loved the most, and whom he chose as witnesses of
His transfiguration, and of the miracle by which he raised to life
the daughter of the ruler of the Synagogue, and whom He wished to be
present when He retired to the Mount of Olives to pray to His Father
before being taken prisoner by the Jews.
After the Ascension of Jesus into
Heaven James preached His Divinity in Judea and Samaria, and led many
to the Christian faith. Soon, however, he set out for Spain, and
there made some converts to Christianity. Among these were the seven
men who were afterwards consecrated bishops by Saint Peter, and were
the first sent by him into Spain. James returned to Jerusalem and,
among others, instructed Hermogenes the magician in the truths of
faith. Herod Agrippa, who had been raised to the throne under the
emperor Claudius, wished to curry favour with the Jews. He therefore
condemned the James to death for openly proclaiming Jesus Christ to
be God. When the man who had brought him to the tribunal saw the
courage with which he went to martyrdom, he declared that he too was
a Christian. As they were being hurried to execution, he implored
James’
forgiveness. The Apostle kissed him, saying: “Peace be with you.”
Thus both of them were beheaded, James having a little before cured a
paralytic.
His body was afterwards translated to
Compostella, where it is honoured with the highest veneration.
Pilgrims flock there from every part of the world to satisfy their
devotion or pay their vows. The memory of his natalis
is celebrated by the Church today, which is the day of his
translation. But it was near the feast of the Pasch in 43 AD that,
first of all the Apostles, he shed his blood at Jerusalem as a
witness to Christ.
Dom Prosper Guéranger:
Let us today hail the bright star which once made Compostella so resplendent with its rays that the obscure town became, like Jerusalem and Rome, a centre of attraction to the piety of the whole world. As long as the Christian empire lasted, the sepulchre of Saint James the Great rivalled in glory that of Saint Peter himself.
Among the Saints of God there is not one who manifested more evidently how the elect keep up after death an interest in the works confided to them by our Lord. The life of Saint James after his call to the Apostolate was but short. And the result of his labours in Spain, his allotted portion, appeared to be a failure. Scarcely had he, in his rapid course, taken possession of the land of Iberia when, impatient to drink the chalice which would satisfy his continual desire to be close to his Lord, he opened by martyrdom the heavenward procession of the twelve which was to be closed by the other son of Zebedee. O Salome, who gave them both to the world and presented to Jesus their ambitious prayer, rejoice with a double joy: you are not repulsed. He who made the hearts of mothers is your abettor. Did He not, to the exclusion of all others except Simon His Vicar, choose your two sons as witnesses of the greatest works of His power, admit them to the contemplation of His glory on Thabor, and confide to them His sorrow to death in the garden of His agony? And today your eldest born becomes the first-born in Heaven of the sacred college: the protomartyr of the Apostles repays, as far as in him lies, the special love of Christ our Lord.
But how was he a messenger of the faith, since the sword of Herod Agrippa put such a speedy end to his mission? And how did he justify his name of son of thunder, since his voice was heard by a mere handful of disciples in a desert of infidelity? This new name, another special prerogative of the two brothers, was realised by John in his sublime writings in which, as by lightning flashes, he revealed to the world the deep things of God. It was the same in his case as in that of Simon, who having been called Peter by Christ, was also made by Him the foundation of the Church: the name given by the Man-God was a prophecy, not an empty title. With regard to James too, then, Eternal Wisdom cannot have been mistaken. Let it not be thought that the sword of any Herod could frustrate the designs of the Most High upon the men of His choice. The life of the Saints is never cut short. Their death, ever precious, is still more so when in the cause of God it seems to come before the time.
It is then that with double reason we may say their works follow them. God Himself, being bound in honour, both for His own sake and for theirs, to see that nothing is wanting to their plenitude. “As a victim of a holocaust He has received them, says the Holy Ghost, and in time there will be respect had to them. The just will shine, and will run to and fro like sparks among the reeds. They will judge nations, and rule over peoples. And their Lord will reign forever” (Wisdom iii. 6‒8). How literally was this Divine oracle to be fulfilled with regard to our Saint! Nearly eight centuries, which to the heavenly citizens are but as a day, had passed over that tomb in the north of Spain where two disciples had secretly laid the Apostle’s body. During that time, the land of his inheritance, which he had so rapidly traversed, had been overrun first by Roman idolaters, then by Arian barbarians, and when the day of hope seemed about to dawn, a deeper night was ushered in by the Crescent. One day lights were seen glimmering over the briars that covered the neglected monument. Attention was drawn to the spot which henceforth went by the name of the field of stars. But what are those sudden shouts coming down from the mountains, and echoing through the valleys? Who is this unknown chief rallying against an immense army the little worn out troop whose heroic valour could not yesterday save it from defeat? Swift as lightning, and bearing in one hand a white standard with a red cross, he rushes with drawn sword upon the panic stricken foe, and dyes the feet of his charger in the blood of 70,000 slain.
Hail to the chief of the holy war, of which this Liturgical Year has so often made mention! Saint James! Saint James! Forward, Spain! It is the reappearance of the Galilaean Fisherman, whom the Man-God once called from the barque where he was mending his nets; of the elder son of thunder, now free to hurl the thunderbolt on these new Samaritans who pretend to honour the unity of God by making Christ no more than a prophet.
Henceforth, James will be to Christian Spain the firebrand which the Prophet saw “devouring all the people round about, to the right hand and to the left, until Jerusalem will be inhabited again in her own place in Jerusalem” (Zacharias xii. 6). And when after six centuries and a half of struggle, his standard bearers, the Catholic kings, had succeeded in driving the infidel hordes beyond the seas, the valiant leader of the Spanish armies laid aside his bright armour, and the slayer of Moors became once more a messenger of the faith. As fisher of men, he entered his barque and gathering around it the gallant fleets of a Christopher Columbus, a Vasco di Gama, an Albuquerque, he led them over unknown seas to lands that had never yet heard the name of the Lord. For his contribution to the labours of the twelve, James drew ashore his well-filled nets from West and East and South, from new worlds, renewing Peter’s astonishment at the sight of such captures. He, whose apostolate seemed at the time of Herod III to have been crushed in the bud before bearing any fruit, may say with Saint Paul: “I have no way come short of them that are above measure Apostles, for by the grace of God I have laboured more abundantly than all they” (2 Corinthians xii. 11; 1 Corinthians xv. 10).
PATRON of Spain, forget not the grand nation which owes to you both its heavenly nobility and its earthly prosperity. Preserve it from ever diminishing those truths which made it, in its bright days, the salt of the earth. Keep it in mind of the terrible warning that if the salt lose its savour, it is good for nothing any more but to be cast out and to be trodden on by men (Matthew v. 13). At the same time remember, O Apostle, the special cultus wherewith the whole Church honours you. Does she not to this very day keep under the immediate protection of the Roman Pontiff both your sacred body, so happily rediscovered in our times, and the vow of going on pilgrimage to venerate those precious relics? Where now are the days when your wonderful energy of expansion abroad was surpassed by your power of drawing all to yourself? Who but he that numbers the stars of the firmament could count the Saints, the penitents, the kings, the warriors, the unknown of every grade, the ever-renewed multitude, ceaselessly moving to and from that field of stars where you shed your light on the world?
Our ancient legends tell us of a mysterious vision granted to the founder of Christian Europe. One evening after a day of toil, Charlemagne, standing on the shore of the Frisian Sea, beheld a long belt of stars which seemed to divide the sky between Gaul, Germany and Italy, and crossing over Gascony, the Basque territory, and Navarre, stretched away to the far-off Province of Galicia. Then you appeared to him and said: “This starry path marks out the road for you to go and deliver my tomb. And all nations will follow after you.” And Charles, crossing the mountains, gave the signal to all Christendom to undertake those great Crusades which were both the salvation and the glory of the Latin races, by driving back the Muslim plague to the land of its birth.
When we consider that two tombs formed, as it were, the two extreme points or poles of this movement unparalleled in the history of nations: the one in which the God-Man rested in death, the other where your body lay, O son of Zebedee, we cannot help crying out with the Psalmist: “Your friends, O God, are made exceedingly honourable!” (Psalms cxxxviii. 17). And what a mark of friendship did the Son of Man bestow on His humble apostle by sharing His honours with him when the military Orders and Hospitallers were established to the terror of the Crescent for the sole purpose, at the outset, of entertaining and protecting pilgrims on their way to one or other of these holy tombs? May the heavenly impulse now so happily showing itself in the return to the great Catholic pilgrimages, gather once more at Compostella the sons of your former clients. We, at least, will imitate Saint. Louis before the walls of Tunis, murmuring with his dying lips the Collect of your feast, and we will repeat in conclusion: “Be, O Lord, the sanctifier and guardian of your people that, defended by the protection of your Apostle James, they may please you by their conduct, and serve you with secure minds.”
