In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and
of the Holy Spirit, amen. Glory be to Jesus Christ.
Today is October 23rd, the Feast of St. James,
the Brother of the Lord. It is also, by the way,
the fourth anniversary of the repose of our daughter,
Daria, who died of a massive heart attack four
years ago today. So I would ask you today especially
to remember her in your prayers. St. James. If
you look in the New Testament, you'll see that
there are three Jameses that are mentioned prominently
as apostles. Two of them were of the twelve apostles.
That's James. the son of Zebedee, and James,
the son of Alphaeus. James, the son of Zebedee,
went on to preach the gospel in Spain, where
he is especially revered. And then James, the
son of Alphaeus, probably went to Egypt, though
the tradition about where he preached is not
as strong as the tradition about James. in Spain.
Then we have the third James, who is called an
apostle in the broad sense of that word. He wasn't
one of the 12 original apostles. Who is this
James? He is called in the, well, you hear it
in the gospel, they say that it's not his father
Joseph and his mother Mary. and his brothers,
and mentioned a number of brothers. This is that
James is one of them. So James is, to use our
technical term, a half -brother of Jesus. A son
of Joseph by a previous marriage. He is by tradition
an older person than Mary. and he had been married
before, so Joseph was a widower. So James is
called by that rather exalted title, the brother
of God, because Jesus is God who became man.
Ha -adelphotheos in Greek, brother of God, brother
of the Lord. If you notice sometimes, in icons
or frescoes of the flight into Egypt when Mary
and the Christ child and Joseph fled because
of Herod's desire to kill the infants. Sometimes
you'll see a young man who's leading the donkey.
Mary and the Christ child are on the donkey Joseph
is following alongside, and there's a young man
who's leading them. Iconographically and artistically,
that represents this James, the brother of the
Lord, the half -brother once again of Jesus.
He was also the first bishop of Jerusalem. You
hear this mentioned in today's second epistle,
Paul's epistle to Galatians. He said he went
up and conferred in Jerusalem with Peter and
James, the Lord's brother. That is the James
who was the first bishop of Jerusalem. He ended
his days as a martyr. He was thrown off a wall.
didn't die from the fall, and they stoned him
to death. That is the way this James ended his
earthly life and earned the crown of a martyr.
First Bishop of Jerusalem, he's also accredited
with being the author of one of the ancient liturgies
of the church, the Liturgy of St. James, which
the church allows this particular liturgy to
be celebrated on the feast day of St. James.
And I've served that several times. It's a fascinating
liturgy, but I think the reason why, one of the
reasons it isn't done more frequently is that
the priest's prayers are much more prolonged
than they are even in the liturgy of St. Basil.
But this liturgy of St. James is really the grandparent
of the liturgy we serve now. So in liturgical
history, you have this very ancient liturgy of
St. James, from which was drawn a shorter liturgy,
the Liturgy of St. Basil. And then St. John Chrysostom,
the liturgy we're most familiar with, is, if
you will, an abbreviation. of the Liturgy of
St. Basil. So he's the author of this particular
Divine Liturgy of St. Basil. He also figures
prominently in chapter 15 of the Acts of the
Apostles, which was the first, if you will, council
in the church when the apostles got together
and... decided that vexing question, which was
really in many quarters tearing the church apart.
Do the converts to Christianity from paganism,
the so -called Gentile converts, do they have
to observe all the ritual prescriptions and particularly
the dietary laws of Judaism? Your familiarity
with St. Paul's epistles, you know how often
he addressed that particular issue. But the bishops,
the apostles got together in the mid -50s probably.
They gathered together, reassembled in Jerusalem,
and they addressed this issue. And the head of
the church in Jerusalem, who in a way was the
spokesman, for the Hebrew party, the Jewish party
within the church. He said, this is his articulation
of the apostolic decision of the Council of Jerusalem
in Acts 15. James says there, it has seemed good
to the Holy Spirit. and to us, to lay upon you
no greater burden than these following necessary
things, that you abstain from what has been sacrificed
to idols, and from blood, and from what has been
strangled, and from unchastity. That what has
been strangled might seem rather peculiar to
us, but this was the ancient, this is an expression
of the ancient attitude that the blood of a living
thing contained its essence or its soul, so to
speak. So if you eat this blood of an animal,
then you sort of acquire the animal characteristics,
so to speak. Now, we, of course, know that that's
not true, but this is one of the sensitivities.
So, same thing with strangling, because you strangle
an animal, the blood's still in it. So, James
said, all you have to do is don't eat anything
that's been sacrificed to idols and anything
that hasn't had the blood drained out of it.
Then, of course, that very... general admonition
to abstain from chastity, from immoral behavior,
which was so prevalent, I was going to say so
prevalent in the ancient world, but I think our
society nowadays sort of rivals that. So that
was the apostolic decision which was articulated
in Acts 15 of... St. James of the Acts of the
Apostles. Finally, the importance of James. He
also wrote one of the epistles in the New Testament.
Obviously, the epistle of James. And this epistle,
it contains a number of just sort of brief exhortations.
From what I can get, I don't see any kind of
connecting. idea in this epistle. They're just
words of advice here and there. And I'm going
to share these words of advice with you because
they're pertinent to us. The epistle begins,
James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus,
to the twelve tribes in the dispersion, greeting.
Well, right away there you get the Jewish background
of this, the 12 tribes. He's addressing the Hebrew
Christians in the dispersion. Dispersion is that
they scattered throughout all the ancient world.
So he goes on to, James goes on to say, count
it a joy, my brethren, when you meet various
trials. A joy when you meet trials. for you know
that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.
Another one. Blessed is the man who endures trial,
for when he has stood the test, he will receive
the crown of life, which God has promised to
those who love him. Every good and perfect gift
comes from above, coming down from the Father
of lights. That should sound pretty familiar,
doesn't it? That's mentioned in the prayer before
the Ambon at the Divine Liturgy. Every good and
perfect gift is from above, coming down from
the Father of lights. Now here's one. For me
and for all of you too, I'm sure. Know this,
my beloved brethren, that everyone be quick to
hear, slow to speak, slow to anger. Be quick
to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger. He
says, be doers of the word, not just hearers.
So what we hear in the scriptures, what we hear
in sermons, what we hear our Lord and the apostles
tell us to do, let's not just hear them, but
let's do our best to practice these. Be doers
of the word, not just hearers only. Here's a
rather peculiar one. Even the demons believe
and shudder. That might seem kind of strange
to you. Do demons believe? Well, it depends on
what you mean by believing. There are several
levels of believing. The basic fundamental one
of believing is what is called historical knowledge.
Who Jesus is, what he taught, what he did. This
historical knowledge is something that Anyone,
a Jew, a Hindu, a Buddhist, anyone can know about
Jesus, that basic historical knowledge, but the
faith of the heart, of course, is lacking. So
this is why it seems peculiar to us. Even the
demons believe. And so what do they do? They
shudder because they know what they have missed
out on. and what they are destined to not have
throughout all eternity. The demons believe in
shudder. Draw near to God, and he will draw near
to you. Do not speak evil against another, brethren.
Oh, how we can be prone to gossip. We have to
watch that. Do not grumble, brethren, against
one another, that you may not be judged. Don't
grumble. He could say to me, don't arp. You know,
I think I've told you before what arping is.
A -A -R -P, retired people. An arper is an old
person, like your grandfather. dictionary tells
us, who complains constantly about small things
that he can't do anything about. So let's not
grumble and arp. You don't have to be old in
order to be an arper. Then there's a second from
the last. In chapter 5, And this you probably
hear if you've attended the anointing of the
sick. This is the scriptural proof text, if you
want to say, that the anointing of sick people
with oil took place in apostolic times. St. James
says, Is anyone among you suffering? Let him
pray. Is any cheerful? Let him sing songs. Is
any among you sick? Let him call for the elders,
the priests or the presbyters of the church.
Let them pray over him, anointing him with oil
in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith
will save the sick man, and the Lord will raise
him up. And if he has committed sins, he will
be forgiven. The last one is a bit like some
of his aphorisms that we've heard a little bit
earlier. He talks about the tongue. Our tongue.
He says, the tongue is a little member. It's
a very small part of our body. The tongue is
a little member. but the tongue is a fire. How
great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire.
What we can say with our tongue. How hard it
is to tame the tongue. With it, we bless the
Lord and Father, and with it, we curse man. who
is made in the image and likeness of God. From
the same mouth comes forth blessing and cursing.
So we have to watch our tongue. How often we
hurt other people, I think most of all, not just
with dirty looks or anything like that, but what
we say to people. And frequently, the ones that
we're closest to. the ones that we love the most,
we take for granted. And we speak harsh words
to them. Don't want to give them the time of
day sometimes. We'd show more civility and courtesy
sometimes to an absolute stranger than sometimes
kids can show to their parents. Husbands can
show to their wives. Wives can show to their
husbands. So this is a good word of advice about
the tongue. How we can use it to bless God and
to say nice things about people. Not critical
and evil things and talk about them and gossip.
We can use it and say good things. We can use
that tongue to be nice and loving. to our parents,
our children, our spouse. So these are words
of advice of my patron saint, James, the brother
of the Lord. If you want to, I'd advise you.
It's a short, his epistle is a relatively short
one. You can just read it straight through without
pausing and praying over it in less than 10 minutes.
But read it through. Pause and pray over some
of his advice. And James can speak to you and
to me just as directly as he spoke in this epistle
to the 12 tribes of the dispersion. So, through
the prayers of our Holy Father, St. James, a
brother of the Lord, God have mercy upon us and
save us. Amen.