It is the fifth Sunday
in Lent, but it is also St. Patrick’s Day.
I am sure it’s fallen on a Sunday more recently, but the last one I
recall was Sunday, March 17, 1991. It
was Palm Sunday that year. I don’t
recall the sermon that I heard that day.
I doubt it had anything to do
with St. Patrick – but this one today does.
The fact that Patrick is commemorated
as a saint at all is a triumph of tradition over history, a common occurrence
in the early centuries of the church. He
wasn’t among the saints who were decommissioned after the Second Vatican
Council partly because there is evidence that he actually existed and probably
because nobody wanted to deal with millions of disgruntled Irish Catholics.
Beyond the fact of his existence, very
little is known about Patrick. He was
born to a wealthy Christian family in Britain near the end of the fourth
century. The name of the town he
identifies as his home is unrecorded anywhere else. His father was a deacon and his grandfather
was a priest. The family was not known
to be particularly devout and it is said that the two entered holy orders for
financial advantage more than anything else.
Patrick showed no particular inclination to religious devotion early in
life. He was educated according to his station
in life and two letters that he wrote in Latin still exist.
When
he was 16 years old, he was kidnapped by pirates, taken to Ireland and sold
into slavery. One of his letters
describes his captivity. The man to whom
he was sold as a slave was a high priest of the druids, the prevailing
religious tradition in Ireland at that time.
Patrick worked for him as a shepherd.
The solitude of that occupation and the stress and sorrow of captivity
inspired in him an increasing sense of religious devotion. He began to pray daily. He describes an experience that occurred in
the sixth year of his captivity. He
heard a voice telling him that he would soon go home and that his ship was
ready. Patrick escaped his captor whose
land he believed to have been in County Mayo.
From there he describes a journey of two hundred miles to a port where
he persuaded a ship’s crew to take him on board. After three days of sailing, Patrick and the
crew landed on what is now the coast of France, abandoned the ship and wandered
for several weeks. Eventually he made
his way back home to Britain.
Patrick’s
letter describes an experience that occurred not long after his return home. It reads: “I saw a man coming, as it were
from Ireland. His name was Victoricus, and he carried many letters, and he gave
me one of them. I read the heading: ‘The Voice of the Irish.’ As I began the letter, I imagined in that
moment that I heard the voice of those very people who were near . . the western sea—and they cried out, as with
one voice: ‘We appeal to you, holy servant boy, to come and walk among us.’” There was, in fact, a bishop named Victricius
who visited Ireland from his home in Rouen, in what is now northwestern France,
during Patrick’s lifetime. After the
experience of this vision, Patrick began formal religious studies after which
he was ordained to the priesthood and returned to Ireland. There he began the work of converting followers
of traditional Celtic religions to Christianity.
He
was received with hostility initially. A
druid text describes the Christian missionary in derisive language. Not unlike Christian missionaries throughout
centuries, Patrick incorporated symbols, rituals and religious practices of
traditional Celtic religion into Christian observance and teaching. Stories about him include one in which he
taught the doctrine of the trinity using the shamrock. It had been sacred to Irish pagans long
before Patrick’s time in Ireland. Its
green color represented rebirth and new life and its leaves called to mind the
number three which was sacred in traditional Irish religion which had three
principal goddesses. The Irish Druids
lit fires as an act of religious devotion.
Patrick encouraged them to continue it and is said to have lit one
himself on the eve of Easter. Legend
holds that his fire could be extinguished by no one but himself.
St.
Patrick was never formally canonized by a Bishop of Rome. In the first thousand years of the church,
canonizations took place mainly on a local and regional level. His feast day, March17, gained greater
recognition in the 18th century through the efforts of an Irish
Franciscan monk.
One
of the letters written by Patrick is entitled Declaration. It describes
his life as a Christian minister. He
claims to have "baptised thousands
of people" . . . and having
“ordained priests to lead the new Christian communities. He reports having converted wealthy women,
some of whom became nuns in the face of family opposition and
converting the sons of kings to Christianity.
Patrick’s Declaration also
describes an incident in which charges were brought against him by fellow
Christians. He does not describe the nature of the complaint, but in the
description of his subsequent trial he writes that he returned the gifts which
wealthy women gave him, that he accepted no payment for baptisms or
ordinations. He writes that he covered
the cost of gifts he made kings and
judges from his own resources and paid for the sons of chiefs to accompany him
on his missionary travels. Historians have concluded that he was accused of
some sort of financial impropriety, and perhaps of having obtained the office
of bishop in Ireland with personal gain in mind. Given his family history, the financial gains
his father and grandfather received from having been ordained, he may have been
especially sensitive to such charges.
As
modern historians began to study Patrick a theory developed which argues that
much of the work attributed to him was actually accomplished by a Bishop named
Palladius. There is a record of his work which took place a few decades
after Patrick’s lifetime. It had less to
do with converting the Irish to Christianity and more to do with ministering to
established Christian communities. At
mid-century this theory of the two Patricks was presumed to be true. Now religious scholars are not so certain
that the work of Patrick is interchangeable with that of Palladius.
It
appears relatively certain that Patrick died on March 17, but there is uncertainty
about the year. At one point it was
believed that he died around the year 420.
Later on 460 became the accepted year of his death but there is evidence
from independent contemporary documents that it could have been later. One writer claims he lived to the age of 120
years, not likely, but it would argue in favor of his having lived to very old
age. Later writers refer to Patrick as
our Papa, that is our Pope or
Primate. The relative lack of
centralization of the Church in the fifth century meant that bishops had great
authority within their own lands.
Centuries
after his lifetime Patrick’s legend continued to grow and a variety of churches
and other places claimed affiliation with various events in his lifetime. Among the miracles associated with Patrick is
ridding Ireland of snakes. In fact,
fossil evidence indicates that Ireland has been a snake-free zone since day
one. They just don’t live there. But Patrick continues to be credited with
driving them all away. Aside from a
handful of incidents described in his own words, we know little more about him
than that he was a beloved spiritual leader.
Patrick’s
spiritual depth was forged in adversity.
As a young man he looked forward to a relatively easy life on the estate
of wealthy parents until the day he was captured and enslaved. He says himself that hardship and solitude
inspired his religious devotion and brought him closer to God. When he returned home and experienced the
call to ministry, he became aware of the limits of his early religious
education. Rather than letting that be a
barrier, or using his family’s position to his advantage, he studied for years
to prepare for ordination. Rather than
following in the footsteps of his father and grandfather, who held comfortable
and lucrative positions as church officials, Patrick returned deliberately to
what he knew would be hostile territory for a Christian missionary and made it
his own.
It
is interesting to note how much the church’s contemporary struggles mirror
those that Patrick encountered in the 5th century. We do our work within a culture that is
increasingly removed from organized religion.
Religious leaders in our time are suspected and frequently rightfully
accused of misconduct. The issues we are
called to challenge include violence, poverty and human trafficking. Like Patrick, we are called as servants to do
the work of turning human nature toward the building of God’s kingdom. It’s no less difficult a task in the 21st
century than it was in the 5th.
Patrick,
the stranger in a strange land, not once but twice, became a beloved
international ambassador for his adopted country. He is the founder of feasts, parades and
celebrations around the world; the patron of numerous professions including
engineers and paralegals and of the city of Rolla, Missouri.
Today
we give thanks for his ministry and his legacy.
And we give thanks that in our church the gifts of myth and tradition
are honored for what they truly are, rather than being tortured into inauthentic
and unsatisfying substitutes for certainty and fact.
Let
us pray
Almighty
God, in your providence you chose your servant Patrick to be the apostle of the
Irish people, to bring those who were wandering in darkness and error to the
true light and knowledge of you: Grant us so to walk in that light that we may
come at last to the light of everlasting life; through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and
ever. Amen.
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