Patrick Loved Ireland Before Ireland Loved Patrick

On the 17th of March, people around the world will celebrate Ireland’s national holiday, St. Patrick’s Day. Is there any other national holiday in the world that is celebrated as internationally as Ireland’s? It is truly unique. So as the bunting goes up and the landmarks turn green and the parades are organised, it’s worth remembering the man who inspired this global celebration. 

Like the holiday named after him, Patrick’s life was truly unique. He did not consider himself a great man, and would likely be uncomfortable with the extravagance of the yearly honours we bestow on him. In his autobiography, he calls himself “a simple country person, a refugee, and unlearned.” The reason he calls himself a “refugee” is because his connection with Ireland, which is how everyone remembers him today, only began when he was sixteen—and it wasn’t a good start at all. The first Irish people that Patrick met were the people who raided his hometown (probably in Wales) and carried off thousands of prisoners—including Patrick—to be sold into slavery in Ireland. Our patron saint’s first sighting of Ireland’s beautiful shores came while he was in the chains of human traffickers. In Ireland, Patrick tells us that he was “brought low by hunger and nakedness daily.” His slavery continued until he was twenty-two years old. This is not the part of the story we celebrate on March 17th.

Eventually, Patrick escaped Ireland and made it home. Which sounds like the happy ending to the story, but it’s not the ending at all because Patrick went on to do something completely unexpected by anyone: he chose to return to Ireland. 

What would possess a man who had finally gained his freedom to return to the land of his slavery? His parents wanted him to stay home. His friends warned him of the dangers he would face if he went back, and they were right: he did face many dangers in Ireland. He wrote that “every day there is the chance that I will be killed, or surrounded, or be taken into slavery, or some other such happening.” While it’s true that many responded positively to the good news of salvation that he shared, others relentlessly opposed him. He counts twelve times when he was in fear for his life, and gives examples of times he was imprisoned and robbed of everything he owned. He could have walked away from all of this trouble and returned home at any time. But he never left.

“I bore insults from unbelievers, so that I would hear the hatred directed at me for travelling here. I bore many persecutions, even chains, so that I could give up my freeborn state for the sake of others. If I be worthy, I am ready even to give up my life most willingly here and now for his name. It is there that I wish to spend my life until I die, if the Lord should grant it to me.”

There were no parades for Patrick when he was living in Ireland. No bunting. No rivers dyed green in his honour. Although Ireland would grow to love Patrick greatly, as we see today, it was Patrick who loved Ireland first. He loved Ireland even when Ireland treated him like an enemy, and doesn’t that sound familiar? It’s exactly how God loves us:

“This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.” – 1 John 4:10-11

Patrick lived these verses out with his whole life in Ireland. By doing so, he changed this island—and the world—forever. If he had stayed comfortably at home, he would have missed the suffering, and we never would have heard of him. There would be no parades on the 17th. But he didn’t stay home, and we are absolutely right to celebrate a life and love like Patrick’s. As great as the parades and decorations are, I think the best way to honour a legacy like Patrick’s is to imitate it—just as Patrick himself imitated his Saviour.