Um...It's SAINT Patrick's day...

Christwriter · Post by **Christwriter** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 9:04 pm

St. Patrick is a Christian saint. Not one of mine (my particular permutation doesn't pray to saints...and I really don't see the point, besides.) St. Patrick's day is in memory of (duh!) St. Patrick.

Somewhere in the states (my sive-like mind let the name out immedately afterwards) there is a St. Patrick's Day Parade that would not allow a Christian youth ministry into the parade because...

(drum roll please)

They were going to carry crosses and the parade admins didn't want anything controvercial in the parade.

Um...Please explain the logic of this, and how it follows the First Adminment of the Constitution? Because this brunette might be having a blonde moment over this.

CW

Warren · Post by **Warren** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 9:08 pm

err.... maybe it was a privately sponsored parade. First Admendment doesn't apply then.

Plus, any Saint whose every story ends with "And then we got drunk" is cool in my book!

ZOMBIE USER 16849 · Post by **ZOMBIE USER 16849** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 9:18 pm

Privately sponsored or not, it IS a little silly to have a parade about a Saint, and not allow Christianity.

I don't know a thing about St. Patrick's day (I ain't down with the Saints, yo), though.

Jaster! · Post by **Jaster!** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 10:05 pm

Saint Patrick was, of course, the Saint that invented the color Green. Before him we had Yellow, and we had Blue, but no one before him had been holy enough to dare forge the two. He was very drunk at the time.

Gage Kronos · Post by **Gage Kronos** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 10:19 pm

Heh...I'm not christian and tend to not get along with the more overzealous followers of the faith, but that does seem a bit stupid to do that.

The First Ammendment says that no laws shall be made to favor or disfavor any religion, and continues to explain basic freedoms the press and such. They probably said no because it was a public parade. I imagine that they would also say no if wiccans wanted to have an entry into a Christmas parade showcasing the Winter Solstice instead of Santa Claus. It's the whole "every holiday is now commercialized and really doesn't relate to the original intent of the holiday" thing.

Happy St. Patricks Day none the less. What? I'm 1/4 Irish!

Luprand · Post by **Luprand** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 10:34 pm

Ah, but does anyone else wear orange on St. Paddy's? Be proud of your North Irish heritage!

... 'course, I have ancestors on both sides of Ireland ... I feel so conflicted.

--Sij

Phact0rri · Post by **Phact0rri** » Wed Mar 17, 2004 10:50 pm

he had a dream to bring religion to the barbarians who ravaged the lands of camboria...

well CW I think its because its a state sponsered event and by broadcasting christianity is not part of state legislation. I think everyone has the right to be in the parade heck its your tax dollars but really I think it has to do with the nasty religious politics right now.

plus heh these days st paddies means an excuse to get tanked anyways. sorry to hear about your ills, write to your town council and tell them your thoughts on it.. show em the people are speaking.

Sippan · Post by **Sippan** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 1:10 am

Before a few days ago, I had no clue who Saint Patrick was, I just knew that dudes in foreign countries seem to care about him for some reason. But then I made extensive research to be able to make a St Patrick's day special in my comic. So now I know that he doesn't like snakes.

MixedMyth · Post by **MixedMyth** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 1:51 am

I forget if St. Patrick was one of those early dieties that was molded into a Saint by the church or not. I know St. Bridget was (as several holidays were), Ijust can't remember if he was one of them or not. Hmmh.

It's true, though, if the parade was privately funded then there's not much that can be done about it. If it wasn't, though, then that's definately something to chew over.

Oh well, happy St. Pattricks Day! Not that I even drink, really. Or am Irish. Well, okay, if you count Scott-Irish (Scotts that were kicked out of Scotland and into Ireland). But then there's also the German, French, English, and Norwegian to consider, too.

Yeahduff · Post by **Yeahduff** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 2:02 am

MixedMyth wrote:Oh well, happy St. Pattricks Day! Not that I even drink, really. Or am Irish.

And that's the issue. Much like Christmas and Easter, St. Patrick's Day is less a saint day and more of celebrating-Irish-customs-and-drinking-lots kinda day in an attempt to secularize it for cultural and marketable reasons. The idea of a public parade was about celebrating and acting stupid while wearing green, not to celebrate a saint, so it's not that insane that the church group wasn't allowed to carry crosses. Not much to be pissed about, though, since all three had Christianity imposed on them when they were Pagan festivals.

MixedMyth · Post by **MixedMyth** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 2:29 am

Yup. Wasn't Easter originally from Oester (spelling), a fertility goddess of some kind? What with the egg and rabbit symbolism and all.

Rkolter · Post by **Rkolter** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 4:58 am

MixedMyth wrote:Yup. Wasn't Easter originally from Oester (spelling), a fertility goddess of some kind? What with the egg and rabbit symbolism and all.

Ostara.

And the saint people celebrate on St. Patrick's day subjegated the Pagan people of Ireland. He considered Pagans not human in the eyes of god and encouraged families who had mostly converted to Christianity to cast out those members who held onto their old traditions.

Nice hero to worship.

Bright spark · Post by **Bright spark** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 5:26 am

I heard today this thing about him. Apparently, so the story goes that back in the days of religious control over politics, He manage to change the law and that becauswe of him every leap yr day (29 feb) the women were able to PROPOSE to men.

Not that it would matter much now, but yeah, you learn something new everyday.

To us, SP's day has always just been us dressing in green and drinking green beer. That's about it.

Sippan · Post by **Sippan** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 7:36 am

rkolter wrote:
MixedMyth wrote:Yup. Wasn't Easter originally from Oester (spelling), a fertility goddess of some kind? What with the egg and rabbit symbolism and all.
Ostara.

The spring goddess Eostra! (And a million other spellings.) That explains it! I've been wondering for so long why the English word "Easter" has absolutely nothing in common with the Swedish word, "P

Grabmygoblin · Post by **Grabmygoblin** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 7:55 am

MixedMyth wrote:I forget if St. Patrick was one of those early dieties that was molded into a Saint by the church or not. I know St. Bridget was (as several holidays were), Ijust can't remember if he was one of them or not. Hmmh.

St. Patrick was a real guy, this is coming from a Catholic school student fro 6 years then Catholic religious school every sunday for another 6 years and mass every sunday for 18 long long long years, and every year at St. Patricks day they always give the same damn sermons about St. Patrick and his life. St. Brigid is a little more debateable, she was supposed to have been a bishop (priestess?), and there was a "perpetual fire" kept burning in her name until 1540, so there is a lot of questions about whether she was a real person that existed in the time of Christanity, or if she is a celtic goddess of some sort that Christians just adopted as a saint in the early days to win over converts. (I'm named after St. Brigid, thats why I know all this)

McDuffies · Post by **McDuffies** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 8:10 am

Saint Patrick was a gentleman
He came from decent people
In Doublin town he built a church
And in he put a steeple

Do you know that Ireland is the only european land where there's no snakes?

Bright spark · Post by **Bright spark** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 8:35 am

Except for adders, they still have them. Apparently.

Luprand · Post by **Luprand** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 9:48 am

[quote="sippan"]The spring goddess Eostra! (And a million other spellings.) That explains it! I've been wondering for so long why the English word "Easter" has absolutely nothing in common with the Swedish word, "P

Gage Kronos · Post by **Gage Kronos** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 10:16 am

rkolter's post about Ostara

That's horrible!

I may never look at the holiday the same again.

MixedMyth · Post by **MixedMyth** » Thu Mar 18, 2004 10:51 am

rkolter wrote: Ostara.

For a moment there, I misread it as 'Olestra.'
*cough*
That's right, I remember now. St. Patrick actually was one of the Irish saints that wasn't taken from earlier religions. And no, I'm not going to try and justify ereadicating indiginous religions or anything.