St. Patrick: A Life Worth Emulating
Today is St. Patrick’s Day. As a kid, all I remember about St. Patrick’s Day was that it was the one day I had to be vigilant to dress correctly (i.e. wear green) or I would pay for it all day long (pinches). Truthfully, I don’t think I even knew that Patrick was a real person until somewhere in my 20’s. It seemed like St. Patrick’s Day was nothing more than an Irish cultural awareness opportunity and an excuse for people to get sloshed on green beer or talk about leprechauns and four leafed clovers. Frankly, none of this appealed to me.
Fast-forward to the present. I got my kids up, fed & dressed them, and dropped them off at preschool this morning only to discover that we were the only household that failed to dress our children in green (I knew it was St. Patrick’s Day, I just forgot about the green clothes thing). My kids in their red sweatshirts stood out like a sore thumb. Parent fail. Luckily, preschool kids are too young to know about pinching each other over not wearing green.
The day started out on the wrong foot, but it ended on a much better note. My older son came home today, predictably, talking about leprechauns and pots of gold (which is precisely what was emphasized at his preschool)… so we decided it was important to educate our boys about one of the MOST significant Christians in the history of the Church. We talked about St. Patrick at dinner and then decided to reinforce it by finding a short animated retelling of his life to show the kids. Nathan (our 5 yr old) was captivated. Truthfully, I was too. Not so much by the very low budget animation, but by being reminded of the incredibly inspiring story of a man who truly embodied the way of Christ. If you don’t know his story, you should familiarize yourself with it: enslaved as a teenager, discovered faith for himself while enslaved, escaped slavery and returned home, studied and became a priest and then a bishop… and then courageously returned to his enslavers to reconcile them to God; spent the rest of his life in mission to the Irish people.
There is incredible wisdom in the historic Church’s decision to dial our attention in on the lives of the saints throughout the year. As you may know, every day of the year is some saint’s feast day. We usually only stop to take notice of the more well-known or significant ones (for example, recently it was Perpetua and Felicity’s feast day - a phenomenal story of courage and sacrifice). Why do these days matter? They are a powerful means of enfleshing the gospel. They take our theology and faith from the realm of abstract or sentimental ideas and ground them in the life of a real person. They show us what the way of Christ (lived especially well) looks like in hundreds of different settings - various eras, locations, life situations, challenges, etc.
Today was confirmation for me again of how I need to hear the stories of the saints. I walked away inspired by Patrick’s courage and faithfulness… by his willingness to go “all-in” for Christ. I needed that again today. It grew my faith and reinforced my commitment to live all of life in reference to Christ.
At Iona House, one of the things we’re excited about doing is celebrating a good number of the feast days (saint days) throughout the year. We’ll enjoy a tasty, communal meal, re-tell the story, and offer a prayer of gratitude in honor of the departed faithful person’s life as we worship God together.
What a joy it is to belong to an incredible, global, historic, and massively diverse family. Today I thank God again for the “communion of saints”, as we say in the Apostles’ Creed.