Word to the Wise
Saturday, October 28, 2023 - Oct. 28 - Sts. Simon and Jude, Apostles
[Eph 2:19-22 and Luke 6:12-19]Jesus went up to the mountain to pray, and he spent the night in prayer to God. When day came, he called his disciples to himself, and from them he chose Twelve, whom he also named apostles. [Luke] You are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the holy ones and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the Apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the capstone. [Ephesians]
For all their importance, we know remarkably little about some of the Apostles. Peter, James and John get a lot of attention in the gospels. Andrew, Philip, Nathanael [Barthlomew] and Thomas get bit parts. Even Jude [Thaddeus] has a line in the Gospel According to John at the Last Supper. Matthias disappeared as soon as he was picked by lot to replace Judas. The Gospel According to Luke, which has more history because of the second volume, the Acts of the Apostles, says little about where the apostles (apart from Peter and Paul) went after Pentecost. Tradition takes over and legends can be a bit fanciful. For instance, both Greece and Scotland lay claim to Andrew. And India claims St. Thomas. Spain has a hold on St. James. Travel was by foot, boat and horse/donkey (maybe pulling carts).
Of the two apostles we celebrate today, Jude [Thaddeus] gets a lot of popular devotion because of the tradition that he is the patron saint of hopeless cases. No wonder he is popular!!! I have preached four St. Jude Novenas in my years of itinerant preaching - two in Chicago and two in New Orleans. The faith of those who attend in St. Jude's intercession is very strong and the situations they describe to me in and out of the confessional merit the attention of St. Jude, to say the least!
Every Sunday, when we recite the Nicene Creed, we profess our faith in "one, holy, catholic and APOSTOLIC church." The Letter to the Ephesians calls the apostles the "foundation" of the church. We can be grateful for their witness, otherwise we wouldn't be making that profession of faith more than 2,000 years after they died! AMEN