-P.Prisciliano Hernández Chávez, Corc.
For the testimonies of Holy Scripture, -The Bible, in its section of the New Testament, both of the Gospels of Matthew, Marcos and Luke, and a passage from the Acts of the Apostles, we have the clear indications to know who Santiago isMajor, disciple and apostle of Jesus Christ Our Lord, to which some nations such as Spain, the capital of Chile, the city of Querétaro, -Mexico, and many temples in America and in the world are linked.
Santiago el Mayor, brother of the Apostle Saint Joh.Among them were María Magdalena;Maria the mother of Santiago (the youngest) and José, and the mother of the children of Zebedee ”(Mt 27, 56);“Among the women who looked from afar was María Magdalena, Maria the mother of Santiago el Menor and José, and Salomé, who had followed and attended when Jesus was in Galilee" (Mc 15,40);“When he spent Saturday, María Magdalena, Maria the mother of Santiago, and Salome bought perfumes to go to anoint the body of Jesus" (Mc 16, 1).They were fishermen who helped their father named Zebedeo;While they were between networks and near the Sea of Tiberíades, Jesus called both brothers: “A little later he saw Santiago, son of Zebedeo, and his brother Juan, who were in the boats praying the networks, and immediately called them (Jesus).They left their father Zebedeo, in the boat with the workers and left behind Jesus ”(Mc 1,19);“Later Jesus saw two other brothers (the previous ones were Pedro and Andrés): to Santiago, son of the Zebedee, and his brother John, who were in the boat with his father Zebedee, praying his networks.He also called them.They, immediately leaving the boat and their father, followed it ”(Mt 4, 21);“Indeed, for the fishing so great that they had done, fear seized Pedro and all those who were with him, even from Santiago and Juan, the children of Zebedee, who were Simon's companions.But Jesus told Simon: ‘Don't be afraid!From now on you will be a fisherman of men ’.Then they took the boats to the shore and leaving everything, they followed it ”.In these passages we know his fisherman's trade, the name of his father and his brother Juan, and his compassionate of the same trade and friends.Jesus approaches them and calls them to follow;Thus begins its discipleship intinent.How great was the attraction of Jesus, who left everything, even if there were some now networks, a father, a mother and an endearing place and followed him, sea inside the depths of life, history and heaven!
Pedro, Santiago and John, are privileged disciples of the Lord, for the missions they will play: Simon, to which the name of Peter changed, because the Church will build on him;To John the Beloved disciple, who deepened the mystery of the Corlazon of Christ and that the fourth gospel of a great contemplative depth bequeathed us, introduces us to the mystery of God's love revealed in Jesus, and offers us a cluster of eminent symbols like the lambof God, who traveled all the Holy Scripture;Santiago el Mayor, the first apostle who died beheaded in Jerusalem, by mandate of Herod Agrippa I, with the desire to end the followers of Jesus.They will witness the resurrection of Jairo's daughter: “But Jesus, without paying attention to what he said, told the Chief of the Synagogue: 'Do not be afraid, he just believes!' And he did not let anyone accompany him but Pedro, Santiago and Juan, Santiago's brother ”(Mc 5, 36-37);They will witness the transfiguration of the Lord: “Six days later, Jesus took Pedro, Santiago and his brother from his, and went up with them to a high mountain.There, in the case of them, he transfigured: his face began to shine like the sun and his clothes became white as the light… ”(Mt 17, 1-2; Mc 9.2; Lc9,28).This fact is remembered and valued in the liturgy of both the East and the West.Eastern Christians have a central position and a mystagogical character, as a gateway to the contemplation of the mysteries of Christ's life: his birth, his baptism, his crucifixion and death, together with the Blessed Virgin and San Juan;celebration that allows to contemplate the human that lets the divine of Jesus show.San León Magno points out his pedagogical appearance: “The main end of the transfiguration was to remove from the heart of the apostles the scandal of the cross, so that the humility of passion for him dear not turbasu faith, having been revealed to them earlyThe excellence of his hidden dignity ”(treated, 51,3), thus anticipation of the glorious mystery of his resurrection.In this epiphanical event, the mysteries of both.T.And n.T.The past with the manifestation of the image of God on Mount Sinai, the law and the prophets, represented by Moses and Elijah;anticipates his glory both in the resurrection and the glory that corresponds to him as the only begotten of the Father.In Jesus we have the compendium of the divine and the human.The agony of Gethsemaní Huertro: "He took Pedro with him and the two children of Zebedeo and began to feel sadness and anguish" (Mt 26,37; Mc 14, 33).Why the three, Pedro, Santiago and Juan?In the Hebrew mentality the superlative indicates, for example when it is said "holy, holy, holy", translated into our mentality would be "Blessed".It is the privileged group of three disciples, we would say, the granado of the chosen ones, although all are important, their apostolic mission, will be paradigmatic for the entire church of all time.
Santiago and Juan, received the nickname of "Boanerges", that is, "children of thunder" for their impetuous temperament: before the refusal of the Samaritans not to receive them because they were heading to Jerusalem,- for former disputes between Samaritans and Jews;"When their disciples Santiago and Juan saw this they said:‘ Do you want us to send fire to heaven and destroy them? ’…" (Lk 9, 54-56).The itinerant discipleship process manifests Jesus' style to educate those who had chosen to be his apostles.They have to internalize the style, words and example of Jesus, to think like Him and love as Him, until life for the total delivery and under the action of the Holy Spirit, be witness-martyrs.Also seeking to be of the former, because they had not understood that the one who wants to be superior must be the most humble and the servant of all;Too human that must exceed that level to be authentically divine for the love of who is "the sum humility" as San Juan de la Cruz teaches it: "Then the mother of the children of Zebedee approached Jesus with them and prostrated himself beforeHe, to ask for a favor.He asked: ‘What do you want?’.She asked him: ‘Order that in your kingdom those two children of mine feel one right and the other on your left’;But Jesus replied: ‘They don't know what they ask!Can you drink the cup that I am about to drink? ’.They answered: ‘Yes we can!’.He told you: ‘You will drink my cup, but sitting on my right and on my left does not correspond to me to grant it, but it is for whom my father has prepared it” (Mt 20, 20).It is the cup that evokes thanksgiving in the sacrifices or at the same dinner of the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world;It is the cup or chalice that the tradition of the Church has read how to participate in the bitterness of the Passion of the Lord;It therefore has a sense of sacrificial, banquet and triumph of the Lord.Santiago, will drink the chalice of the Lord's passion, as well as Peter, John and all the other apostles differently.Santiago will be decapitated, by mandate of Herod Agrippa,-to please the jealous Jews of his law, for the importance that Apostle already had in Jerusalem, after the ascension of the Lord: “At that time, King Herod made some arrest someChurch members with the intention of killing them.He ordered Juan's brother to kill with Santiago, and, as he saw that he liked the Jews, he decided to arrest Peter ”(Act 12, 1-2).It is therefore Santiago the protomartyr of the Apostolic College.
There is a tradition in Spain, linked to the Virgin named del Pilar, because on a pillar appeared to the Apostle Santiago Evangelizer initial of this Iberian Peninsula;Critics divide on the presence in life of the apostle Santiago.Sometimes our historicist mentality, undervalued tradition, which is a special way to also make history, according to its time and circumstances.That is why I dare to cite the testimony of a Spanish mystique, María Coronel y Arana,-in religious life María de Jesús de Ágreda (1602-1665), of the religious conceptionists founded by Santas Beatriz de Silva,-whose body is inHis convent of Toledo, writes the life of the Virgin Mary that entitles the "mystical city of God";This is the mystical phenomenon of visions and the presence of the Blessed Virgin who dialogues with this venerable through which she offers us a history of divine narrative of the life of the Blessed Virgin Mary;It is not a study of dogmatic or spiritual theology;Mary is the mystical city where God lives and in whom divine omnipotence spilled her thanks;These dialogues have the character of dictated by the very holy lady to her scribe, with the literary style of her time.She writes what is understood and known in a private and supportive revelation.It is important to know its position: “This divine story, as in all of it is repeated, left written by the obedience of my prelates and confessors that govern my soul, assuring me by this means to be the will of God to write it and that obeyed its beatísimaMother, who for many years has sent it to me;And although I have put everything to the censorship and judgment of my confessors, without having a word that they have not seen and conferred with me, with all that again to their best feeling and above all to the amendment and correction of the Holy ChurchRoman Catholic, whose censorship and teaching, as his daughter, protest to be subject, to believe of having only what the Holy Church our mother will approve and believe and to reprob what I will reprob, because in this obedience I want to live and die.Amen.”(Mystical City of God, Part III, Cap 23, No. 791).Thus in book VIII, Cap.1 Nº 383 refers to us: “He achieved it congratulations Santiago, and arriving in Ephesus he prostrated at the foot of his mother's mother (sic) spilling copious tears of joy and veneration.And with these living affections the (sic) gave humble thanks for the incomparable favors that by his means he had received from the divine right hand in the pilgrimage and prediction of Spain and for having visited it in it with his real presence and for all the benefits that these theseVisits had done.The Divine Mother, as a teacher of humility, then raised the Holy Apostle and said: My Lord, warn that you are anointed from the Lord, his Christ and his minister, and I a humble bug.-And with these words the great lady knelt down and asked Santiago's blessing as a priest of the Most High.He spent a few days in Ephesus in the company of María Santísima and his brother San Juan, whom he realized everything that had happened in Spain;And with the prudent mother he had those very high colloquiums and conferences ... ".San Isidoro of Seville also echoes this ancient tradition of the mission of the apostle in Spain (De Vita et Obitu Sanctorum, 7,1) in the following number, the Blessed Virgin Mary and the apostle Santiagoconversan on her future martyrdom;she will receive her comforts and support.This happened as the Acts of the Apostles, 12,1-2) narrated it.
Where is the buried body of the apostle Santiago?An tradition of the ninth century, founded on archaeological indications, points out that Santiago's body was taken to Spain and rests in the city of which has taken his name "Santiago de Compostela";This place from the Middle Ages to the present day there are pilgrimages from all over the world;Jacobean pilgrimage, which knows that some queretans have done it.Hence, in the Christian iconography he is represented as a pilgrim, with his bordón, his shell or vieira and his "guajes" for water.
The devotion of Spain by the apostle Santiago crossed the borders and time;In Latin America, a church to memory and cult of this passionate saint, who gave his life to martyrdom for Christ.Querétaro is adorned with some monuments, the first parish of Querétaro, -which before outside the archbishopric of Mexico, and the head of its cathedral, along with the first Roman Santos.
The foundation of this noble and loyal city of Querétaro is for a glorious date on July 25, a liturgical party of the apostle Santiago;Him's shield has the Apostle Santiago on horseback, to remember the possible presence of him at the beginning of this city;Historians refer to, both the great historian Queretano Lic.Don Manuel Septién and Septién in his work ‘History of Querétaro’ Volume I, as the historian Valentín F.Frías in his work ‘Legends and Queretanas’ I.The fight took place in the highest part of the Valley, La Loma del bloodmal.Melee confrontation, without weapons;Darkness became, (-posibly an eclipse).“In the midst of this darkness they suddenly observed both Christians and Gentiles (Chichimecas), such a lively clarity that struck their attention even to the same combatants and saw in the center suspense in the air, a shining cross of white and red colors, as of four long rods and next to its side the patron battle of Spain, the apostle Santiago, rider in its white steed ... ”(Manuel Septién and Septien, or.c.p.19).Don Valentín f.Frías, quote R.P.Fr.Isidro de Espinoza, chronicler, who “says that having eclipsed the sun the stars came out and a cross appeared in the sky, like four rods of size, and next to it the apostlessantiago mounted in Brioso horse;Seen which for the Chichimecas, lost their mood and surrend.Frías, or.c.p 15).That is why the coat of arms of the city, evokes the cross, the apostle Santiago on horseback and two stars that remember the eclipse.
The linking of History and Faith, from the city of Querétaro to the apostle Santiago would imply resume devotion to its inner aspect of transformation in Christ;To accept to take the chalice of the Passion of Christ, as the apostle drank him in the martyrial testimony ofadhesion to the dead Christ and Risen Christ;but also to fulfill all the strength of evangelization in our historical framework and its cultural implications;May the Gospel be the seed of humanism;Only humanismocuando comes to its fullness is Christian humanism, according to Rahner.Our city of Santiago de Querétaro, is a macrourbe or megapolis.We face many peace, family life, cultural life challenges.There are admirable cultural and technical propagents, which must be at the service of all.New lifestyles are given where one -dimensional ideology, religious indifference, or existential vacuum, are sitting their real among us.It is to be desired reliably, that under the sponsorship of the Apostle Santiago, our way of thinking, acting and being underbound low testimony.Give a place to God and every human being, who is our brother; it will be radical if we support him and he has his strength in the love of God and of God.Taking the chalice of Christ, as did the apostle James, leads us to melt our blood and our lives today, to witness love to martyrdom in our own existential context.
