Happy St. Patrick's Day...But Hold the Cornbeef and Cabbage!

  Today marks the annual celebratory festival of the Irish.  Beloved by millions of people across the country and around the world, it's often marked by wearing green, drinking green beer and subsequently feeling green, parades and of course the gold standard of Emerald Isle cuisine, corned beef and cabbage!  That traditional dish with it's pungent aroma of stewed cabbage, potatoes and carrots with slices of pickled beef brisket is everywhere from restaurants to households, but will have no place at my table.  Don't get me wrong, I like potatoes, carrots and even cabbage.  But the combination of them with the beef is enough to send me reeling with nausea.  Maybe it's the Italian in me who's been raised around fresh garlic, olive oil, linguine and clams, traditional spaghetti and meatballs with sausage, I don't know.  But I simply will not for the life of me eat or order it, ever.
  Now don't get me wrong, I love almost all things that the scenic and beautiful country of my Irish brothers and sisters has to offer.  They have great beers and stouts, world renowned whiskeys, Bailey's Irish Cream and awesome Shepherd's Pie, but alas that's about it.  But that's ok as they have never laid claim to be the center of the culinary universe!  Instead the Irish are proud, fiercely loyal, stoic and brave people who's history has been checkered, and difficult at best, but regardless an exercise in persistence and tenacity that make the Irish people truly embrace life.
   Some facts you may or may not know about this great country.  Northern Island is well known for the civil war between Catholics and Protestants.  The ongoing conflict between England and the IRA still subliminally exists. They invented the tank, modern tractor, the submarine, color photography, the cure for leprosy, ejector seats for planes and of course Guiness Stout.  Their national heroes and some famous alumni of the green isle include, actors Liam Neeson, Pierce Brosnan, musicians James Galway and Bono, singers Sinead O'Connor, The Celtic Women, Nobel Prize winning writer and poet, William Butler Yeats, writer Samuel Beckett and many, many more.  They have been instrumental in the building of America and have influenced all walks of life in the USA.  Famous Irish Americans include, Teddy Roosevelt, John Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, Gene Tunney, Ben Hogan, Mark McGwire, John McEnroe, Tom Brady and also many, many more.  But the most influential and greatest hero of Ireland is without a doubt St. Patrick himself.  But do you know his story other than the holiday named after Him?  Well, if not, here you go!  This biography is from the website Catholic Online.
 
Patrick was born around 385 AD in Scotland, probably Kilpatrick. His parents were Calpurnius and Conchessa, who were Romans living in Britian in charge of the colonies.
As a boy of fourteen or so, he was captured during a raiding party and taken to Ireland as a slave to herd and tend sheep. Ireland at this time was a land of Druids and pagans. He learned the language and practices of the people who held him.
During his captivity, he turned to God in prayer. He wrote
"The love of God and his fear grew in me more and more, as did the faith, and my soul was rosed, so that, in a single day, I have said as many as a hundred prayers and in the night, nearly the same." "I prayed in the woods and on the mountain, even before dawn. I felt no hurt from the snow or ice or rain."
Patrick's captivity lasted until he was twenty, when he escaped after having a dream from God in which he was told to leave Ireland by going to the coast. There he found some sailors who took him back to Britian, where he reunited with his family.
He had another dream in which the people of Ireland were calling out to him "We beg you, holy youth, to come and walk among us once more."
He began his studies for the priesthood. He was ordained by St. Germanus, the Bishop of Auxerre, whom he had studied under for years.
Later, Patrick was ordained a bishop, and was sent to take the Gospel to Ireland. He arrived in Ireland March 25, 433, at Slane. One legend says that he met a chieftain of one of the tribes, who tried to kill Patrick. Patrick converted Dichu (the chieftain) after he was unable to move his arm until he became friendly to Patrick.
Patrick began preaching the Gospel throughout Ireland, converting many. He and his disciples preached and converted thousands and began building churches all over the country. Kings, their families, and entire kingdoms converted to Christianity when hearing Patrick's message.
Patrick by now had many disciples, among them Beningnus, Auxilius, Iserninus, and Fiaac, (all later canonized as well).
Patrick preached and converted all of Ireland for 40 years. He worked many miracles and wrote of his love for God in Confessions. After years of living in poverty, traveling and enduring much suffering he died March 17, 461.
He died at Saul, where he had built the first church. 

  You see without St Patrick's faithful service, Ireland would be a pagan nation today.  Instead he like St. Valentine, St. Nicholas and St. Joseph spent their lives in service to our loving and almighty Lord.  All of them are celebrated through holidays on the calendar and all were devout men of faith who helped paved the way for the spread of modern Christianity.  Unfortunately they are usually just footnotes to the raucous and often unchristian like celebrations that are supplanting their noble work and divine service.  By the way did you know that the shamrock is famous because St. Patrick used it to describe the Holy Trinity when he taught, not for luck as it's known today.  So when you raise that green beer and dig in to that steaming plate of corned beef and cabbage, salute all that God gave us Irish, especially the man who gave his life's service for Ireland's spiritual future!  Top of the morning to you all!  I'm off to order a pizza!

John 12:26
If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him.

 

Speak Now or Forever Hold Your Peace!

There is an eerie malaise sweeping across and overwhelming America.  One that doesn't cause concern with most of us immediately or even seem to affect our daily lives, but it's festering and spreading like an aggressive cancer that will eventually kill it's victim.  It's called silence, and it's turning out to be deadly to us.  Everywhere that it exists it's opposition flourishes like weeds in a roadside ditch.  Since God and the Holy Bible have existed and humanity has been around, there has always been the struggle between good and evil.  Triumph and tragedy, victory and defeat, life and death, they all coexist because we can't have one without the other. The stories of good triumphing over bad have given us hope, courage, and new beginnings.  There has always been a light at the end of the tunnel and a sun to come up on a new day.  But at this moment in time things are changing and darkness is enveloping us.
  Whether you know it or not the voices of wrong are not out numbering the voices of good, but instead they are out shouting, out working and out changing our country.  Some people call it long overdue progress, or social justice.  Others say it's just our ever evolving enlightened society.  I call it a reshaping of Morality.  It is a large and hardly innocuous seismic event that is breaking apart our country and we must choose to engage or be run over.  Whether you are Democrat, Republican or Independent, white, black, Asian, Hispanic or Indian it doesn't matter.  Child or adult, rich or poor, it doesn't matter.  It has infected us all!  We have become so self absorbed and narcissistic, so withdrawn from the concerns of our fellow man that chronic apathy has saturated our lives and turned us into foolish cartoon like caricatures of what were designed to be.  Truth be told, not enough of us care!  The war of propaganda and governance being waged today is so slanted and biased that it is changing everything from the making and enforcing of laws, to reinterpreting or changing on the fly current laws, that there is no room for the scales of justice to work equally.  Respect and obedience to the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are under constant assault!  Courts and judicial benches are interpreting laws for political gain.  Contrary to what you may be thinking, this is not a right or left argument.  It's a wrong or right argument!  If we are not willing to speak up, get involved, take a stand, or care enough to even vote why should we complain?  Americans have always stepped up when called upon or compelled by their beliefs to do so.  If courageous African Americans like the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. or Rosa Parks didn't speak up the civil rights movement might not have happened.  If America hadn't gotten involved in World War II then how many more innocent people would have died and how many more Jews would have been killed?  If pro-life volunteers don't show up at abortion clinics and protest, how many more babies would be killed or young mothers traumatized?  Finally, if God hadn't loved us and sent His only Son to die for us what hope would we have?  I could go on and on.  The fact is we need to battle for what we believe in!  We need to speak up and fight for our country.  This not about you but us, our children and grand children!  What are they inheriting?  Look at the list of goodies.  Chronic long term job loss, higher and higher tax burdens, unsustainable debt, lower moral relevancy and increased decay, distrust in government, Christian persecution, traditional God given institutional change, decaying personal rights and freedoms.  Shall I continue?  And where is the church in all this?  That in itself is a sad discussion for another day.  Whether you like it or don't like it, agree or disagree, these shifts are occurring.  A recent poll was taken and asked Americans if they thought their children were better off being born now or 50 years ago.  Overwhelmingly the poll indicated 50 years ago.  Hmm... I wonder what America was like then?
  I for one am willing to forsake anything and everything in my life to wage the good fight!  Melissa and I have been immensely blessed in our lives and we have the five greatest children God could give us!  So we are and will continue to speak up.  Because I would rather be respected than admired, and leave something better than something worse behind when God calls me home.  We owe it to ourselves, our children and our country!  Because if America's light goes out, so then goes the worlds!  The time is now and the stakes couldn't be higher.

Ephesians 4:25
Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another.