Celebrating Saint Patrick, the slave who converted his captors

I remember when I first wanted to move to Ireland.

Oh, I’d seen beautiful photos, like this:

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And in later years I was enchanted by films that painted a charming picture of Irish village life, like "Waking Ned Devine" (highly recommend).

Serve something Irish, and I don’t mean a shamrock-shaped Domino’s pizza. I’m pretty sure there’s a law that you must eat potatoes to truly celebrate Ireland.

But the real reason, held tightly in my elementary school heart, was that I read a story of how Saint Patrick drove all the snakes out of Ireland.

And man, do I hate snakes.

Of course I eventually realized that was a myth, which may have been an allegory for driving pagans out of the Emerald Isle, or something along those lines.

But I still may have to move to Ireland, because — here’s a cool thing — apparently the fossil record shows there never really were any snakes there. That’s my idea of heaven!

In reality, though, it turns out that the coolest thing about all this was Patrick himself. (And I’m going to refer to him as Patrick, because all of us who have been saved by faith in Christ are now saints in Him. Here’s a good explanation of that truth.)

The real Patrick

Patrick was British, born into a Christian family around the fifth century. He wasn’t really a believer himself, apparently, but things changed at age 16 after he was captured by Irish raiders who forced him into slavery in Ireland. The hardships he endured drove him back to God, and his faith deepened.

Six long years later, he managed to escape back to his family in Britain — but after a dream in which he understood God to tell him to return to Ireland, to convert the pagans to faith in the one true God, he did exactly that.

Patrick did not drive out all the pagans (or snakes), but he is reported to have planted churches and made thousands of converts. Perhaps due to his Christian family, which included a deacon and possibly other learned individuals, he also had quite a grasp of Scripture, as theologian and pastor Kevin DeYoung notes:

In his "Confessio" Patrick writes movingly about his burden to evangelize the Irish. He explicitly links his vocation to the commands of Scripture. Biblical allusions like "the nations will come to you from the ends of the earth" and "I have put you as a light among the nations" and "I shall make you fishers of men" flow from his pen. Seeing his life’s work through the lens of Matthew 28 and Acts 1, Patrick prayed that God would "never allow me to be separated from His people whom He has won in the end of the earth." For Patrick, the end of the earth was Ireland.

But what I find most inspiring about Patrick is that he may well have been the first person in Christian history to take those scriptures literally — to understand that bringing Christ to “all nations” meant, as DeYoung notes, “teaching even barbarians who lived beyond the border of the frontiers of the Roman Empire.” And this after being enslaved to them!

What an amazing legacy. If you want the whole story, DeYoung recommends "The Barbarian Conversion: From Paganism to Christianity," which explains how Christianity swept (slowly) across Europe.

So by all means, celebrate Patrick, on March 17 or any other day. Getting drunk (the traditional adult celebratory activity) doesn’t seem a proper tribute to the man, of course, so here are some better and more family-friendly suggestions.

Celebrating Patrick: History

• Revelation Media is offering two DVDs on Patrick’s life, one for the kiddos, for those donating to the company's faith-based productions.
• There are countless children’s books about Patrick, but this fairly new entry looks beautiful: "Saint Patrick the Forgiver" from Intervarsity Press.

Celebrating Ireland — just for fun

• Play traditional Irish music (Spotify and other music services can help here). The Irish Rovers can be a little salty, but they’re a lot of fun.
• Enjoy watching traditional Irish dance. Let the kids try to dance along!
• Did I mention that you (adults) really must watch "Waking Ned Devine"?
• For the little people in your life, "Darby O’Gill and the Little People" seems perfect.
• For very little people, "Jamie O’Rourke and the Big Potato: An Irish Folktale" is cute little board book.
• Serve something Irish, and I don’t mean a shamrock-shaped Domino’s pizza. I’m pretty sure there’s a law that you must eat potatoes to truly celebrate Ireland, and we’re big fans of a hearty potato soup, but that’s hardly the only option.
• Wear green (obviously).
• Kiss under a shamrock (okay, I made that one up).