The Story of St. Patrick
Every March 17th people celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, a day of wearing green, leprechauns, parades, and green beer. Patrick is attributed as the one who chased the snakes out of Ireland along with other “myths.” In reality, none of these have anything to do with the life of Patrick.
The Life of St. Patrick
The Romans conquered Britannia between 55 BC and AD 77. Under Roman rule the Britons adopted Roman customs, law, and religion. Many were taken by the Romans as slaves. The Romans built many roads, towns, bath houses and buildings. Trade and industry flourished under Roman rule. The influence of Biblical Christianity was also prevalent.
In circa 200 AD, Tertullian mentions that "the extremities of Spain, the various parts of Gaul, the regions of Britain which have never been pene- trated by the Roman armies, have received the religion of Christ" (Def. Fidei, p. 179). Joseph of Arimathema, Paul, and Peter are believed to have made missions trips to the area.
As the Roman Empire began to crumble under the weight of external and internal problems, Rome had to call its troops home leaving Britain unprotected. Marauding gangs from Ireland began raiding Britain around AD 400 capturing many for slaves. About AD 410 Succat Patricius was captured and made into a slave.
As a 16 year old teenager, he was captured during a raiding party and taken to Ireland as a slave to herd and tend sheep. He became shepherd-slave to King Miliucc. Ireland at this time was a land of druids and pagans. St. Patrick learned the language and practices of the people who held him.
Patrick’s life of slavery has been described as:
“The life of the Sheppard slave could not [have] been a happy one. Ripped out of civilization, Patrick had for his only protector a man who did not hold his life highly, let alone anyone else’s. The work of such shepherds was bitterly isolated, months at a time spent alone in the hills. The occasional contacts which one might normally seek out, could bring their own difficulties. Deprived of intercourse with other humans, Patrick must have taken a long time to master the language and customs of his exile, so that the approach of strangers over the hills may have held special terror. We know that he did have two constant companions, hunger and nakedness, And that the gnawing in his belly and the chill on his exposed skin were his worst sufferings, acutely painful presences that could not be shaken off.”
Ireland was a beautiful island shrouded in terrible darkness. Warlords and Druids ruled the land. The Druids were fanatical sun and serpent worshippers. Their unholy trinity was called Belenus, Teutates, and ESUS. Human sacrifice and cannibalism was just as common there as in the New World and Africa. It was a miracle that Saint Patrick didn't end up as one of their diabolical sacrifices. The Irish of the fifth century were a pagan, violent, and barbaric people.
Patrick had been raised in a Christian home, his father being a deacon in the church. Now, in great despair, he began to reflect on his early years at home.
His salvation experience is found in his confessions. “Before I was humbled I was like a stone lying in deep mire, and He that is mighty came and in His mercy raised me up and, indeed, lifted me high up and placed me on top of the wall. And from there I ought to shout out in gratitude to the Lord for His great favours in this world and for ever, that the mind of man cannot measure”
As he wrote in his Confessions, "I would pray constantly during the daylight hours" and "the love of God . . . surrounded me more and more.” He stated that “faith grew and the spirit was roused, so that in one day I would say as many as a hundred prayers and after dark nearly as many again, even while I remained in the woods or on the mountain.” "He saw that as God chastising him, first of all," says Rev. Sean Brady. "That was the first view. He says we deserved what we got. Were carried at 16 years of age over to this foreign land.” Yet the Lord has a way of getting our attention!
Patrick would experience an amazing miracle. Six years after his capture, God spoke to Patrick in a dream, saying, "Your hungers are rewarded. You are going home. Look -- your ship is ready.” So he traveled 200 miles across the country, boarded a ship, and returned home.
Patrick would enter Bible college and eventually be ordained (AD 430) as a bishop in the church. Yet the call to go back to Ireland and preach became overwhelming. "One night, he had a dream. There was a man who came from Ireland with a whole bunch of letters. And he opened up one of the letters and it said 'The Voice of the Irish.' And then he heard a voice coming out of this letter that said, 'Holy boy, please return to us. We need you.’” "He talks about how he, in this dream, is trying to pray and yet he can't," says Freeman. "So he hears a voice coming from inside of him which he realizes is the voice God praying for him.” So Patrick heads to Ireland around AD 460 to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ!
Patrick would soon confront the Druids and he would do so in a unique way. Not fearing the King nor offending cultural tradition, He boldly presses on.
"Part of the pagan worship of fall to spring, from the beginning of the summer, was that a fire was lit, and first of all, the fire on the hill of Tara and no other lights at all in Ireland.” This monastery on the hill of Slane is where Patrick -- in direct defiance of the high king of Tara -- lit a forbidden fire. "He was summoned before the king, and he explained that he wasn't a threat, because he was bringing the new light, the light of Christ, the Savior of the world, the Light of the world."
And Light he did bring to the island! Through Patrick, God converted thousands. Cahill writes, "Only this former slave had the right instincts to impart to the Irish a New Story, one that made sense of all their old stories and brought them a peace they had never known before." Because of Patrick, a warrior people "lay down the swords of battle, flung away the knives of sacrifice, and cast away the chains of slavery.” Within his lifetime or soon after his death, the Irish slave trade came to a halt, and other forms of violence, such as murder and intertribal warfare, decreased. The results of “preaching the Gospel, of course, baptizing converts, confirming them, appointing pastors.” William Cathcart tells us he "founded 365 churches and consecrated the same number of bishops, and ordained 3,000 presbyters.” As late as “1631 the English Baptists discovered, and subsequently corresponded with, small communities of Baptists in Ireland and found them to be sound.”
No work of God ever goes without opposition. Patrick states “In sadness and grief, shall I cry aloud. O most lovely and loving brethren and sons whom I have begotten in Christ (I cannot number them), what shall I do for you? I am not worthy to come to the aid of either God or men. The wickedness of the wicked has prevailed against us. We are become as it were strangers.” He encouraged his enslaved converts, “O most dear ones... I can see you, beginning the journey to the land where there is no night nor sorrow nor death.... You shall reign with the apostles and prophets and martyrs. You shall seize the everlasting kingdoms, as He Himself promised...” In spite of the trouble James Barker states “Ireland became known as the ‘Isle of Saints and Scholars.’ For more than six hundred years, Irish missionaries carried the Gospel with the same truthfulness as Patrick’s to Britain, Germany, France, Switzerland, Italy and beyond. For example, Columba and his companions set out from Scotland in 563. Columbanus and his companions went to evangelize France and Germany in 612.”
Was Patrick a Roman Catholic?
Historian Henry Vedder states, “Rome’s most audacious theft was when she seized bodily the Apostle Peter and made him the putative head and founder of her system; but next to that brazen act stands her effrontery when she ‘annexed’ the great missionary preacher of Ireland and enrolled him among her saints.” If Patrick had been a Roman Catholic then some- where there would be support for that, but there is none. Patrick wrote Confession, or Epistle to the Irish and Epistle to Coroticus and in neither did he refer to Rome. The Breastplate, a hymn, is also attributed to him. Not one of his early biographers mentions any Roman connection. Moreover, there is no support for the claim that Pope Celistine sent him to the Irish people. Professor George T. Stokes, a prominent scholar, declared that before the synod of Rathbresail in AD 1112, the rule of each Irish Church was independent, autonomous, and “...dioceses and diocesan episcopacy had no existence at all.”
Another Irish scholar wrote that “... Leo II was bishop of Rome from 440 to 461 AD and up-wards of one hundred and forty of his letters to correspondents in all parts of Christendom still remain and yet he never mentions Patrick or his work, or in any way intimates that he knew of the great work being done there.” So, until after 461, the Roman Church had not tried to make Patrick as one of their major “saints.” He stated ‘It is Christ who gave His life for thee (and) is He who speaks to thee. He has poured out upon us abundantly the Holy Spirit, the gift and assurance of immortality, who causes men to believe and become obedient that they might be the sons of God and joint heirs with Christ.” In this one statement Patrick alludes to various Bible doctrines i.e. substitutionary atonement, indwelling of the Holy Spirit, gifts of the Spirit, assurance of salvation, sonship of every believer, and our heirship with Christ. Furthermore, “Patrick believed that the elements were only pictures of Christ's body and Christ's blood. Dr. Jarrell wrote, “'In all the descriptions of the Eucharist quoted there is no evidence that it is...’, or literally becomes the flesh of Christ and His blood. The elements are merely symbols of such.”
Patrick baptized thousands of Irish but there is no record of him ever baptizing infants. He always baptized converts. Patrick wrote, "Perhaps, since I have baptized so many thousand men..” He mentions baptizing captives, handmaidens, women, and believers. Moreover, his baptisms were by total immersion. He speaks about “seven princes and over twelve thousand more were con- verted on that day, and were soon baptized in a spring called Tobar Enadhaire" (The Baptist Encyclopedia [1881], by William Cathcart).
We would describe Patrick today as an Independent, Fundamental Bible-believer. My friend, if you are not sure about your relationship with Christ, seek out a Bible-believing Baptist church!
Pastor Jim Walker
Gospel Light Baptist Church, 235 N. Crismon Rd., Mesa, AZ 85207
