The girls and I are proud of our Irish roots, so we like to celebrate St. Patrick's Day by wearing green and festively dying food items green, as well - today we had sweet green rolls, instead of sweet orange rolls for our holiday breakfast, with our breakfast strips. We are not, however, truly fans of the so-called St. Patrick. Filled with misogynistic guilt for knocking someone up in his youth, good ol' Patrick decided to atone by persecuting the Druids (also known as driving the snakes out of Ireland), instead of, oh, maybe, getting married and supporting his child. We aren't the sort of "Christians" who approve of religious persecution, so we celebrate being Irish today, but not Patrick.
March 17 is also the birthday of Jazz - a fine reason to celebrate all on its own.
4 comments:
You've been caught out, you fellow reader of Mists of Avalon!
Sometimes people point out to me that most of the Christian holidays have pagan roots, and it's as if they're saying, "Ahhhhhh, I'll bet you didn't know that, aren't you shocked?" I for one am glad that our Christian holidays have pagan roots. Pagan means "country dweller" (paganus), and I am glad to have earthly roots for heavenly aspirations.
I like this post: http://blogapotamus.blogspot.com/2005/03/slinte.html
The nuns had us chatted up about those snakes along time before Mists did, I'm afraid, although they were in favor of driving the snakes out.
I am also happy with my pagan roots. I am pretty equally comfortable with interpreting the Divine from a Christian perspective or a pagan-esque perspective, actually - to me, the Light of God is so much bigger than any way we try to comprehend that Light - every way that we try to understand it is just something that helps our tiny minds get a glimpse. I am baffled by the need that people like Patrick have to force their views of God on others. I am content to know that my understanding is infinitely small.
What do you think about wearing green and orange? Orange is the color of the Protestant Irish, I think. I don't want to emphasis the troubles, but it seems like it's fair to acknowledge both.... Why should everything be green alone?
You have a good point, there...although I definitely come down on the Irish sovereignty side. I don't even like to admit that I have any Saxon ancestors mixed in....
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