He was the son of Alphaeus. Was he the Lord's relative? 
	This is doubted. Was he James the younger (or the "lesser",
	Matt. 15:40)? There are insufficient reasons to establish
	this either. Nothing is known of him. 
	
	The patron saint of our Parish is St. James the Lesser. 
	He was possibly the son of Mary and Alpheus of Cleophas. 
	His mother, Mary, would have been either a sister or a 
	close relative of the Blessed Virgin. For that reason, 
	according to Jewish custom, he was sometimes called "the 
	brother of the Lord". 
	
	An ancient tradition has identified this James with James 
	the Lesser from the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. 
	Thus the tile "the Lesser", which literally means "the 
	little one", came to be transferred to James, son of 
	Alphaeus. The expression "the Lesser" refers either to 
	size or age and not to relative importance. 
	
	After the death, Resurrection, and Ascension of our Lord, 
	when the Apostles scattered over the world, St. James 
	remained behind as Bishop of Jerusalem. In that capacity, 
	he was one of the principal speakers for the early Church, 
	especially in the face of questions from the Jews. 
	Scripture records James as having a pivotal role in the 
	problem of how much Jewish obligations should bind the 
	new Christians and ultimately suggesting that only four 
	Jewish practices be imposed on Gentiles wishing to be 
	followers of Christ. 
	
	Traditionally, biblical scholars have considered James, 
	the son of Alpheus, as the same James called " the brother
	of the Lord", the same James who speaks with the voice of 
	authority in the early church. Some modern scholars, 
	however, hold that there may have been two persons named 
	James. The first being the son of Alpheus, one of the 
	twelve, and the second being "the brother of the Lord" 
	who was the author of the Epistle of James, and an 
	authoritative figure in the early church. Among the 
	reasons these modern scholars cite their opinion for 
	this belief is the fact that in his epistle, James speaks 
	of the apostles in the past tense and does not identify 
	himself as an apostle. The scholars also comment that the 
	elegant Greek literary style used by the author of the 
	epistle would not likely be used by a Galilean peasant. 
	
	History has two accounts of the martyrdom of St. James 
	the Lesser. According to Flavius Josephus, St. James was 
	stoned to death in 62 A.D. According to Hegesippus, a 
	second century ecclestiastical historian, James was 
	thrown from the pinnacle of the Temple in Jerusalem by 
	the Pharisees. When the fall didn't kill James, he was 
	beaten to death with clubs. Traditional symbols of James 
	the Lesser are a club with which he was martyred, and a 
	book representing the biblical letters he wrote. 
	
	The feast of St. James the Lesser is celebrated in the 
	Latin rite of the Church on May 3, along with that of 
	St. Philip.