Saintly Business
Thoughts on Pat and Joe...
Having grown up Catholic, with all those saints and their miracles, I believed that those blessed folks belonged on the pedestals where their statues perched. When I became a Lutheran, and read Martin Luther’s pronouncement that we were all saints and sinners both, I was briefly scandalized. But, as Saint Pat’s ma commented in my little humor essay, “in many ways, saints are ordinary people,” and so I have become quite comfortable with the notion that (even) I am in the company of the saints—at least once in awhile.
I still love the saints’ days of March 17th (Saint Patrick) and 19th (Saint Joseph), though, and the attendant myths and legends surrounding these holy men. Take it away, Pat and Joe!
SAINT PATRICK, PATRON OF IRELAND
HUMOR FROM ELISE: THE TRUE STORY OF SAINT PATRICK (AS TOLD BY ME, HIS MA)
Hello everyone! Since we’re all here celebratin’ “Saint Patrick’s Day,” I, Saint Patrick’s mother, think it’s time to set the record straight about Paddy. Every year I hear so much misinformation, and I think some of you are spreadin’ it on purpose, you with your cheap plastic shamrocks and your disgustin’ green beer! “Everyone is Irish today!” is a poor excuse for your shenanigans. Well, Mr. O’Goldberg, everyone is NOT Irish just because it’s March 17th, and you know it, don’t you? The priest should be hearin’ some confessions IMHO!
So, first off. Let me address the tall tale that Patrick was actually born in Britain. Britain! Not a chance! In fact, he was born right here in County Clare. Paddy’s now over 1700 years old and, in the grand tradition of Irish bachelors, he still lives at home. You also may have heard about Paddy being kidnapped and sold into slavery. Ha! That rare bit of blarney comes from Pat’s pal Seamus Kelly. What an eejit! Seamus loves to brag that he’s friends with a saint, and then he fancies up the story, especially after four or five pints down at the pub. Patrick was no more kidnapped than Deidre Sullivan, and believe me anyone who’d kidnap that oul biddy would bring her right back, because Deidre can talk the ears off a donkey.
Have you ever heard that Patrick drove the snakes out of Ireland? I ask you: how on God’s green earth do you DRIVE out of Ireland? Think about it. It’s an island, you dopes!! Plus Patrick never did get his license. He couldn’t figure out the roundabouts, nor all the highway signs in Gaelic, as he wasn’t exactly a world-beater in Irish language class. Nor was Patrick much of a science student either, or he’d be able to explain that when snakes evolved, Ireland was still underwater. When it came to the surface, it attached to the European land mass, so snakes were able to make their way over there. Then, during the Ice Age, Ireland was frozen over, and cold-blooded creatures would have been unable to survive. By the end of the ice age, approximately 10,000 years ago, Ireland had separated from the mainland, so the snakes would have had no way of getting here. And that is why there are no snakes in Ireland. Could Pat have told you all that? Absolutely not! I love the boy but he’s thick as a brick.
Now then, people say Patrick used a shamrock in a field to explain the Holy Trinity. Jesus, Mary and Joseph, can you just imagine him thinkin’ that one up? Neither can I. He is always sayin’, “Ma, tell me again how there are three persons in one God!” And once more I have to pull out the tea kettle and an ice cube, and tell him that water is solid, liquid and gas, but it’s still water. Shamrocks! Phooey. Plus Pat has the allergies, and wouldn’t be sittin’ down in any fields of clover.
Over time Patrick has been promoted, in Seamus Kelly’s telling at least, from priest to bishop, and now he’s a saint of the church. I admit it’s every Catholic mother’s dream, but truly? The boy was always much more interested in Guinness than God, and of a Sunday he’ll skip Mass altogether to go down to Mick Flaherty’s place to buy rounds for all his hooligan pals. The idea of himself wearing the collar! I don’t think so!
But ever since Seamus Kelly started those rumors, Patrick doesn’t want to lift a finger around the house because he’s “sanctified.” I tell him, “luck and laziness go hand in hand.” Then he says, “May the cat eat you and the devil eat the cat.” Then I say, “put a beggar on horseback and watch him ride!” Then he says, “the windy day is not the day for thatching.” And I end the argument with, “An old broom knows the dirty corners best” and I hand him the old broom. Never play dueling Irish proverbs with an Irish mother!
So there you have him, the real Saint Patrick. I know it’s much more fun to imagine a grand hero flingin’ snakes into the sea with one hand and spoutin’ theology with the other. Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you.
Oh, while I’m about it, some of my girls in the Holy Mother’s Club wanted me to burst a few more bubbles. Saint Valentine’s ma says he never brings anyone flowers, and chocolate makes his skin break out. Saint Nicholas’s ma reports that Nicholas is a really selfish bugger, wouldn’t give you a present if you were the Lord God almighty. Saint Anthony’s ma wants you to know that he can’t find your stuff; in fact he can’t find his own way out of a paper bag. And finally, from Saint Francis’s ma: Frank cannot talk to the animals; he is not flippin’ Doctor Doolittle!
But, if it makes you feel any better, I CAN tell you that everything you’ve ever heard about leprechauns is the God’s honest truth.
Well, now enjoy your yearly wearin’ of the green, but remember that in many ways, the saints are ordinary people. Especially Patrick. God bless him, but the patron of Ireland is a real droop on the stoop.
I’m off to say the rosary at Saint Pa--well, you know who’s--Church. May the road rise to meet you, and so on and so forth. Ta ta for now.
SONG: DANNY BOY sung by Jim McCann
From Irishman Jim McCann (who also sang with The Dubliners for years) comes my favorite of all the renditions of this classic, unless you count the beautiful rendering by the Commonwealth Youth Choir. Our Peter, who sings in the Sonata group of the choir, LOVES “Danny Boy.” Frankly, I always tear up no matter how it is performed…
SAINT JOSEPH THE MULTITASKER:
SUPER FOSTER DAD…
How was he chosen? In a dream? Did Mary swipe right? Did a lily grow from a staff to indicate his favor with God? However it happened, Joseph seemed to be a loving, hard-working, tireless protector of his Holy Family. You might even say he was an absolute saint.
SUPER REALTOR…
CENTURY 1 ‘S TOP AGENT? APPARENTLY IT’S SAINT JOE…
Steve and I got really lucky with timing when we sold our first house…it was Spring 1989, and a red-hot real estate market. So we never did resort to the superstitious burial of a Saint Joseph statue upside down in our yard. Millions swear by this trick, though. And I’m not ruling it out if we ever sell again!
SUPER SWALLOW WHISPERER
This lovely story was one of the reasons we decided on March 19th for our wedding date. Unlike swallows in Capistrano, though, Steve and I made our newlywed nest in…suburban Atlanta!
…and there’s the happy couple (3-19-77)!
BLOG PREVIEW: THE HUMMING BLUEBIRD OF HAPPINESS
After decades of trying in vain to attract hummingbirds and bluebirds to my yard, I’ve concluded—they don’t really exist! Join me over at Working Title and prove me wrong!
INSPIRATIONAL QUOTE OF THE WEEK:
In a world that seems determined to cut down all the flowers of joy and beauty and hope, it’s good to be reminded that spring will be here soon, no matter what. Happy Vernal Equinox, my friends!
