Saints Alive
Saint of the Month for May
Our saints for this month are Philip and James the Lesser, whose holy days are commemorated on
May 1. James the Lesser is known as the Lesser because he was both younger and shorter than James the
Great, John’s brother and the first apostle to die for the faith. So, in this manner of speaking, “Lesser” is
does not mean “less than.” Indeed, this James was the first bishop of Jerusalem. In tradition he was so
known for his piety and spent so much time on his knees in prayer that they were to have resembled the
knees of a camel. He is the patron saint of the dying, no doubt because of the grisly and moving circumstances
of his death. James preached a wonderful sermon from the Temple of Jerusalem. This angered the
Sanhedrin so much that they had him thrown off the tower. He survived, only to continue to murmur
prayers. The angry crowd began stoning him; he prayed for them and blessed and forgave them. They
then beat him to death with a club; in art James the Lesser is often shown with a fuller’s club. He was
called the “brother of our Lord,” and he was one of those to see the risen Lord after witnessing Christ’s
death with his (and Jesus’) mother. The Epistle of James is attributed to him.
Philip is our other saint this month. Nearly everything we know about him comes from the New Testament.
He was a fisherman from Galilee whom Christ called to follow him. Philip most likely was a follower
of John the Baptist and became an apostle early on. It is Philip who assisted in feeding the Five
Thousand; he remarked that eight months wages would not buy enough bread for members of the crowd
to have even a little. So he is often shown in art with a basket of bread, and is known as the patron saint of
bread makers and pastry chefs. He preached the Gospel in Phrygia and was crucified upside down in
Hierapolis. His relics were translated to Rome and placed in the basilica of the Twelve, but an ancient inscription
refers to both Philip and James, which may be why we acknowledge their contributions on the
same day. By tradition Philip fought Satan, who was disguised as a dragon guarding the Temple of Mars
in Greece. The story has Philip subduing Satan with merely a cross.
-Beth Savage