Last Word

St. Patrick

The patron saint of Ireland, Patricius and later St. Patrick, was born “Maewyn Succat” to wealthy parents, somewhere in southern Scotland or Wales in the midto late-5th century. At 16, Irish raiders kidnapped him from his parents’ villa, brought him to Ireland and sold him into slavery. For six years he toiled in solitude as a herdsman, and he attributes that time to when his faith flourished. Toward the end of his enslavement, he writes he had a dream that the ship that was to aid in his escape was ready, and so he fled from his captors, found a ship and convinced the crew to stow him away for the journey back to Britain.

He soon responded to the call of the church and became a priest, taking the name Patricius—Latin for “father figure.” Several years later, he had another dream in which he was delivered a letter titled “The Voice of the Irish.” As he read the letter, he heard several Irish voices begging him to return. “Deeply moved,” he said, “I could read no more.” He soon returned to Ireland. For years he crisscrossed the Emerald Isle, baptizing and confirming converts while under threat of martyrdom, torture and imprisonment.

St. Patrick was, justifiably, a fervent antislavery activist and was well ahead of his time and his faith in condemning the act. He writes that he was “humbled every day by hunger and nakedness” while enslaved and he particularly noted the resilience of enslaved women at the time, writing, “But it is the women kept in slavery who suffer the most—and who keep their spirits up despite the menacing and terrorizing they must endure.” St. Patrick was venerated as a saint but has never been formally canonized. (Canonized means official admission by the pope to sainthood. During St. Patrick’s era, there wasn’t a formal canonization process, so many saints from that period were given the title if they were martyrs or seen as extraordinarily holy.)

There are a number of legends associated with St. Patrick, but few are based in fact. He did not banish snakes from the

island (Ireland was too cold during the Ice Age for reptiles to survive), but the symbolism of banishing evil continues to be associated with him. There is no evidence he used a shamrock to explain the Holy Trinity, although the tradition of placing clover on your lapel on St. Patrick’s Day is still practiced. And there is no evidence St. Patrick wore green. In fact, historians believe he mostly wore blue garments. Green became a symbol of rebellion for the Irish from English rule in later centuries. St. Patrick’s Day, March 17, the traditional day of St. Patrick’s death, began being celebrated in the early 1600s but didn’t become a major holiday in Ireland until just recently. For centuries, it was believed the first American St. Patrick’s Day parade was held in Boston in 1737; however, an historian recently found evidence in St. Augustine, Florida, of a St. Patrick’s Day parade held in 1601 to honor the “protector” of the city’s corn fields.

Having corned beef and cabbage on St. Patrick’s Day is an Irish-American tradition. Irish immigrants adopted the brining technique of curing meat from Eastern Europeans and called it “corned” due to the corn-sized salt crystals used in the brining process. Abraham Lincoln’s first inaugural dinner was corned beef and cabbage.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

S P

We use chiropractic manipulation of the vertebra and joints to yield optimal movement and restore nervous system

function. Chiropractic care is an integrated and complimentary asset in our veterinary practice that can be used in

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to include the immune system. The release of impingements on the spinal cord and related nerves allows the body to

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