Saints Philip and James, Apostles

Philip came from Bethsaida in Galilee. The Gospel of John tells that he brought Nathanael to Jesus, saying “Come and see,” and that at the Last Supper he asked, “Lord, show us the Father.” Tradition holds that he preached in Asia Minor and died at Hierapolis in Phrygia, where a tomb identified as his was excavated in 2011.

James, the son of Alphaeus, is one of the Twelve; Western tradition identifies him with James “the brother of the Lord,” head of the Church of Jerusalem, whom the historian Josephus says was stoned there in 62, though many scholars hold them to be different men. The two apostles are kept together because their relics were placed in the church of the Holy Apostles in Rome, dedicated in the 6th century.