Daily Gospel Reflection
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July 25, 2019
The mother of the sons of Zebedee approached Jesus with her sons
and did him homage, wishing to ask him for something.
He said to her,
“What do you wish?”
She answered him,
“Command that these two sons of mine sit,
one at your right and the other at your left, in your Kingdom.”
Jesus said in reply,
“You do not know what you are asking.
Can you drink the chalice that I am going to drink?”
They said to him, “We can.”
He replied,
“My chalice you will indeed drink,
but to sit at my right and at my left, this is not mine to give
but is for those for whom it has been prepared by my Father.”
When the ten heard this,
they became indignant at the two brothers.
But Jesus summoned them and said,
“You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them,
and the great ones make their authority over them felt.
But it shall not be so among you.
Rather, whoever wishes to be great among you shall be your servant;
whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave.
Just so, the Son of Man did not come to be served
but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
Jesus asked his apostles, James and John, to drink his cup. He invited them to share his suffering and death. That would be their path to the Father’s reward. Jesus then added that his apostles must serve and give their lives for others.
This sums up the essence of the apostolic life: suffering, death, service, and self-gift. The apostles did all of this in imitation of Jesus who suffered, died, served, and gave himself up for our salvation.
Five years ago today, I left my parents’ home and travelled to Cincinnati to begin my formation as a friar preacher. Since then, the feast of St. James always reminds me that Jesus called me to be his apostle. Jesus calls me to suffer, die, serve, and give of myself—for him and for the many to whom he sends me. In different ways, according to our various vocations, he invites the whole of his Church to live as his apostles.
Today at Vespers, the Church will pray:
What shall I render to the Lord
for all his bounty to me?
I will lift up the cup of salvation
and call on the name of the Lord,
I will pay my vows to the Lord
in the presence of all his people. (Ps 116:12-14)
Can we make our own the words of the psalmist? Can we gratefully repay the Lord Jesus who loves us unceasingly? Can we drink the cup he drank?
Prayer
Loving God, teach us to show compassion and mercy towards one another. Help us to carry our crosses and burdens, trusting in your mercy. Like the apostles, may we be faithful and true to our call to follow your Son, humble servants of his Gospel. We ask this in his name. Amen.
Saint of the Day
St. James the Greater is patron saint of Spain and of pilgrims—even today, hundreds of thousands of people journey by foot to visit his tomb in Compostela, Spain.
James was son of Zebedee and Salome, brother to St. John, and cousin to Jesus. He is known as “St. James the Greater” or “St. James Major” only because he was older than another disciple who was also named James (referred to as “Lesser” or “Minor”), and was called by Jesus before him.
James the Greater was one of the first disciples to follow Jesus. Matthew’s Gospel describes him on a boat near the seashore mending his fishing nets when Jesus called him and his brother, John; “immediately they left their boat and their father and followed him” (4:21-22).
Even among the Twelve, James held a special place close to Jesus. He was one of the three disciples with Jesus during the Transfiguration, and he was one of the few present when Jesus raised Jairus’ daughter (Mt 9), even though everyone thought the girl was dead.
James was the first of the disciples to be matyred—he was beheaded by King Herod in the year 44. Jesus called James “son of thunder” because of his fiery temper, and his proclivity to angry outbursts could have been what got him killed so early.
Tradition holds that James traveled to Spain after Pentecost to preach the risen Christ. He was struggling with this mission until Mary appeared to him upon a pillar (which is still preserved in Zaragoza, Spain) and ordered a church built on the site. After that apparition, James returned to Judea and was killed by Herod. The disciples took his body by boat from the Holy Land back to Spain, and carried it inland to Compostela, where it now rests.
During the Muslim conquest of Spain, his relics were lost, but were recovered in the ninth century and venerated at Compostela. The popularity of St. James grew throughout Spain and beyond, and a network of roads and trails leading to Compostela emerged as pilgrims streamed there. Santiago de Compostela became a pilgrimage site that rivaled Rome and the Holy Land, and hundreds of thousands of faithful still make the pilgrimage today.
The symbols of pilgrims and of Compostela became symbols for St. James as well—the cockle shell (as pictured here in a stained glass window in the Morrissey Hall chapel) and pilgrim’s staff. He is depicted as a pilgrim in this painting by Rembrandt.
St. James is also patron of those who suffer from arthritis, and his relics rest in the reliquary chapel in the Basilica.
St. James the Greater, the first disciple to give his life for the faith, and the patron of pilgrims, pray for us!
Image Credit: Our featured image of St. James the Greater is available for use under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. Last accessed March 20, 2025 on Wikimedia Commons.
