ST. PADDY, WE LOVE YA!

by Pam North

March 17th, St. Patrick's Day, will soon be here, and many of us will
take part in festivities that mark the occasion.  The parades, parties,
speeches, dinners, dances and pub gatherings are all part of it, traditions
proud and rowdy that shout out IRISH!  The beginning of it all was far more 
religious and austere, however; it was the death of St. Patrick.

The person who was to become Ireland's patron saint was born in Britain
in the latter half of the 4th century AD.  His given name is believed
to be Maewyn Succat; his first name was Romanized to Patricius, and he
would later come to be known as St. Patrick.  His parents were wealthy;
his father was Calpurnia, a Roman-British army officer.  Patrick considered
himself pagan until the age of sixteen, when a group of Irish raiders attacked
his parents' estate, taking him prisoner.  He was transported to Ireland,
where he spent six years in captivity.  During that period he was put to work 
as a shepherd.  Isolated from other people, and experiencing
loneliness and fear, he turned to religion for solace, becoming a devout
Christian.  He managed to escape, and went to Gaul to study in a monastery
under St. Germain, bishop of Auxerre.  During his twelve years in training 
there, he became aware that his calling was to convert pagans to Christianity.
His desire was to return to Ireland to begin his mission, but instead his 
superiors appointed St. Palladius.  Patrick's opportunity came two years later
when St. Palladius was sent on to Scotland, and Patrick became the second 
bishop of Ireland.  Although Patrick was not known to be a great scholar, his 
talent lay in converting the Gaelic Irish, then pagans, to Christianity.  He 
even made inportant converts among royal families.  His success at his work 
made him an enemy of the Celtic Druids, and Patrick was arrested several times,
although he always managed to escape.  His travels throughout Ireland fostered
the growth of monasticism.  He established dioceses, schools and churches; he 
developed a native clergy and held church councils.  His mission in Ireland 
lasted thirty years, until he retired to County Devon.  He died on March 17, 
in 461 AD.  His influence was so great that it was inevitable that much Irish 
folklore has sprung up around him, most of it without any real substantiation.
There is some belief that he raised people from the dead, and that he gave a
hilltop sermon during which he drove all the snakes from Ireland.  Since no 
snakes were ever native to Ireland, this latter story is perhaps a metaphor 
for his conversion of pagans.  The three-leafed shamrock, now traditional as 
a symbol of Ireland, supposedly was used by St. Patrick in his teachings to 
illustrate the Trinity; Father, Son and Holy Ghost existing as three separate
elements of the same entity.

The date of St. Patrick's death is still commemorated, although it has evolved
from a holy day to more of a secular holiday.  It is Ireland's greatest 
national holiday, as well as a happy day for Irish who have immigrated to other
lands.  In the United States it is an occasion for them to celebrate their 
Irish ancestry and the fact that they have overcome prejudice and stereotyping 
to become valuable citizens in this country.

St. Patrick's Day evokes a variety of images and traditions.  There are the 
leprechauns, those mischievous sprites dressed like shoemakers, who if 
successfully captured, must tell the secret of where their pots of gold are 
hidden.  Also part of the folklore is the Blarney Stone, that part of the wall
of a castle built in 1446 in the village of Blarney, that bestows the gift of 
persuasive eloquence to anyone who can twist himself into position to kiss it.
School children will pinch any of their classmates who have failed to wear 
green on that day, despite the fact that the Irish are not fond of green, 
since it is the color of the old flag that flew over an Ireland that was not 
free.  The color green, corn beef and cabbage, and green beer are strictly 
American touches to the holiday.  Oddly enough, the first St. Patrick's Day 
parade took place not in Ireland, but in America.  Irish soldiers serving in 
the English military marched through New York City on March 17,1762; the music
and marching helped the soldiers connect with their Irish roots.

St. Patrick's Day has become as much an American holiday as an Irish
one; it has evolved into an event where the "wearing of the green" adorns
the lapel of many a person whose forefathers have never been acquainted
with the shores of Ireland.  And why shouldn't it?  In America we are all one.