If we celebrate St. Patrick's Day, why shouldn't we celebrate the Pope who sent him?
The papacy is such a strange thing. They have the most spiritual power (and responsibility) of everybody in the whole world, and have often wielded great temporal power as well. But how many of us know more than a handful of them? I actually rather like this fact, and not for any Ozymandias-style sense of forgotten grandeur. Perhaps I like it because it makes history seems so spacious and irregular.
By comparison England has equal regard for both Gregory the Great and Augustine of Canterbury. But there's a difference. Augustine definitely was SENT by Gregory, fellow Roman, neither of them had first-hand experience of Britain that we know of. Patrick very much had the inspiration to send himself, given even Celestine 's involvement.
ReplyDeleteI discovered yesterday that Titus Brandsma started composing a Way Of the Cross during his imprisonment; many of the meditations end with a prayer to the Apostle of his district, St Boniface . Even during those times, and maybe more so because of the state of Europe in his time, he decided to invoke the original preacher to the Friesians.
Well, that's a pleasing correspondence. I like it when that kind of thing happens. And Brandsma is such an interesting guy, I'm surprised he's not a more popular figure.
DeleteI wonder if any nation has been identified with its patron saint as much as Ireland?
Monaco seems to honour it's patrons with royal pomp... I've heard other small states... Barbados has St Andrew's Day as a national holiday and the Order of St Andrew as a civic award, they chose the feast to cut official ties to the British throne a few years ago. Honouring Rhianna in place of Elizabeth or Charles is hardly edifying though, even from an Irish perspective; perhaps she keeps the economy afloat
DeleteWell, I would always prefer a monarch as a head of state, although for preference I'd have the monarch living in a granny flat.
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