I’ve heard many complaints this year about St Patrick’s Day. How dare the Catholic Church tell us not to celebrate it this year?! “Who cares what the Catholic Church says, St Patrick is important to us, and so I will celebrate his day by drinking lots of green beer.”
The fact of the matter is simple. His feastday is in Holy Week, and this means, as with other saints who have their feasts this week, the feast is set aside for the commemoration of Christ’s passion. Why is this an outrage? St Patrick was a Christian. He is a saint only because he was a follower of Christ. St Patrick would be the first to say that the point is not to celebrate himself but to celebrate the life, work and passion of Christ. If you really want to honor St Patrick this year, don’t use his feast day as an excuse to get drunk; if you want to honor St Patrick, get involved with Holy Week activities. It is what he would be doing.
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