The Feast of Saint Philip and Saint James, kept on the first of May, joins two apostles whose faith was shaped by close proximity to our Lord in his earthly ministry. Philip was among the first called, and he in turn brought Nathanael. At the Last Supper, when the disciples were troubled, Philip voiced the longing of the whole company: Lord, show us the Father, and it sufficeth us. The answer he received — He that hath seen me hath seen the Father — is the theological heart of this feast and one of the most direct statements of Christ's divine identity in all of the Gospels.

James the Less, son of Alphaeus, is distinguished from James the son of Zebedee whose feast falls in July. He was numbered among the Twelve and was known in the Jerusalem church as a man of prayer; tradition remembers him as a pillar of the community that held the faith through the first generation of persecution.

The appointed Collect prays that we, following the steps of these holy Apostles, may perfectly know Christ as the way, the truth, and the life — and so stedfastly walk in the way that leads to eternal life. The Epistle from James 1 teaches that the wisdom needed for that walk is to be asked from God without wavering. The appointed Gospel from John 14 gives the great declaration in full: I am the way, the truth, and the life; no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. The feast is a meditation on the knowledge of God as a gift given in Christ himself — received not by intellectual achievement but by faith and following.