The Truth About St. Patrick

Ireland never had any snakes.

This is Leslie Harris, and you might not want to read this, but I’m here to tell you the truth about Saint Patrick.

First of all, Saint Patrick wasn’t Irish. He may have been English, Scotttish, Welsh or even Roman.

He was living in England when he was captured and sold into slavery across the sea into Ireland. He escaped and headed back to England a few years later, but returned to Ireland to bring Christianity to the land. Now, the rest is a bit murky.

You’ve heard that Saint Patrick is famous for having driven the snakes out of Ireland, but experts agree, there never were snakes in Ireland. The climate is simply too cold. So how did this myth get started?

The snakes were a metaphor for pagans, as many pagans had serpents tattooed to their forearms. So, St. Patrick is famous for bringing Christianity to Ireland, thereby driving out paganism. But was that a good thing?

Some people believe that Patrick was good and kind and persuaded the pagans to forsake their ways. Some people believe that Patrick convinced the king that the pagans were evil, and the king had his army burn down the pagans’ homes, and force them to relinquish their ways, or at least take them underground. Some people believe the pagans WERE evil, making human sacrifices and such, and needed to be stopped. No one knows for sure.

Oh and by the way, the story of Saint Patrick using the Shamrock to explain the Holy Trinity? That one’s not true either.