Thomas the Apostle
Saint Thomas the Apostle is the patron of architects, builders, and masons because of a vivid legend from the apocryphal Acts of Thomas: sent to evangelize India, he was hired by King Gundaphorus to build a magnificent palace, but spent the money on the poor and the sick — when the king demanded his palace, Thomas answered that he had built it in heaven, a palace the king would enter only after death. The builders’ trades took as their patron the apostle who, in the story, was commissioned as a master builder and built an everlasting house. His patronage of India is solid tradition: he is honored as the apostle who carried the Gospel there, and the ancient Saint Thomas Christians of Kerala trace their faith to his preaching and his martyrdom near Madras.
Saint Thomas the Apostle, also called “Doubting Thomas,” is best known for initially refusing to believe in Christ’s Resurrection until he could see and touch the wounds. When Jesus appeared to him, Thomas proclaimed “My Lord and my God!” — one of the clearest declarations of Christ’s divinity in the Gospels. Tradition holds he preached the Gospel in India.
