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St. Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland, is a widely known historical figure and arguably the most famous patron saint of a country.
Despite this level of fame, we know surprisingly few details about his life. Interestingly he’s not the only recognised patron saint of Ireland, both ‘Brigid of Kildare’ and ‘Columba’ are officially recognised as such.
Also, St Patrick is a patron saint of Nigeria, Montserrat, and Engineers.
It is generally accepted that St. Patrick was born in Northern England or Southern Scotland to wealthy parents around 385AD. His original name was probably Maewyn Succat. He later adopted Patricius as his Christian/Roman name, which became widely known as Patrick.
While he was only sixteen, Patrick was taken prisoner after a band of raiders from Ireland had attacked his family’s estate in Wales. They took him back to Ireland where he spent six years in captivity as a slave. It is said that it was at this time, while he was working as a shepherd on Slemish mountain that he became a devout Christian.
He eventually escaped from his slavery to Gaul (in modern-day France) where he studied for twelve years in the monastery under St. Germain, the bishop of Auxerre. It was during this period of training that Patrick realised his calling in life was to become a missionary and convert pagans to Christianity.
After his training, he wanted to return to Ireland, to convert the native pagans there to Christianity. But he had to bide his time as St. Palladius was ordained by Pope Celestine and sent to Ireland as their first bishop. It was over two years later when Palladius was transferred to Scotland, that Patrick was appointed as the second bishop to Ireland.
Patrick proved himself to be quite adept at winning converts to Christianity. So much so, that he upset the local Celtic Druids. In fact, he was arrested on several occasions but managed to escape each time. He journeyed extensively across Ireland, establishing monasteries in several locations. In addition, he also set up churches and schools, all of which created the foundations for the whole of Ireland to eventually be converted to Christianity.
His missionary work in Ireland continued for thirty years. After that, Patrick retired to County Down in North-Eastern Ireland. Patrick died on March 17th in 461AD, apparently at the ripe old age of 122, according to the Annals of the Four Masters, a chronicle of medieval Irish history.
He was canonised by the local church, as was the practice at the time, thus his elevation to sainthood was never formally granted by a Pope; however, he is in the church’s official list of Saints. The day became a feast day due to lobbying by the Irish-born Franciscan scholar Luke Wadding in the early part of the 17th century, though it soon evolved into more of a secular holiday.
Much Irish folklore surrounds St. Patrick’s Day, Some of this lore includes Patrick healing the sick, and raising the dead.
He is said to have given a sermon from a hilltop that drove all the snakes from Ireland. No snakes are know to have existed in Ireland at least since the end of the ice age. Some scholars think the driving away of the snakes may have been a metaphor for the conversion of the pagans.
A more plausible story attributed to Patrick is how he used the Shamrock, a three-leaved clover, to explain the Trinity. In his sermons he would use it to represent how the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit could be separate elements of the same entity.
Today, St. Patrick’s Day is a day to recognise Irish heritage and celebrated by people of all backgrounds in many parts of the world, such as the United States, Canada, and Australia. Although these are the main overseas populations, St. Patrick’s Day is also celebrated in other locations as far-flung from Ireland as Japan, Singapore, and Russia.
It was first publicly celebrated in the United States of America in Boston in 1737. Surprisingly, the first recorded St. Patrick’s Day parade didn’t actually take place in Ireland, when on March 17th 1762, Irish soldiers serving in the English military marched through New York City.
The global spread of the holiday was partly due to the Great Potato Famine of 1845 which forced over a million of the Irish population to emigrate.
World Sleep Day is an annual event, intended to be a celebration of sleep and a call to action on important issues related to sleep, including medicine, education, social aspects and driving.
It is organized by the World Sleep Day Committee of the World Sleep Society and aims to lessen the burden of sleep problems on society through better prevention and management of sleep disorders.
Time and time again, sleep medicine professionals and researchers came up against the belief that sleep was not important enough in personal health and well-being to be a priority. That coupled with society’s 24/7 flow, the founders of this awareness event aim to celebrate the importance of healthy sleep.
World Sleep Day is held the Friday before Spring Vernal Equinox of each year.
March 20th has been established as the annual International Day of Happiness and all 193 United Nations member states have adopted a resolution calling for happiness to be given greater priority.
This campaign is a global celebration to mark the United Nations International Day of Happiness. It is coordinated by Action for Happiness, a non-profit movement of people from 160 countries, supported by a partnership of like-minded organisations.
International Day of Happiness has been celebrated since 2013 to make people aware of the importance of happiness in their lives. The UN has initiated this by including the Right to Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness in the Internal Law for Human Rights.
“Happiness is not achieved by the conscious pursuit of happiness; it is generally the by-product of other activities.”
The concept of International Happiness Day is based on the Gross National Happiness (GNH) concept of measuring happiness which was started in Bhutan. The report is prepared on indicators such as per capita income, GDP, health, social cooperation, mutual trust, freedom to make life-related decisions, and generosity.
This day was first observed in 2021. It is backed by the Global Rewilding Alliance, an umbrella group for organisations in more than 70 countries that are looking to restore ecosystems by returning land to nature, the day will be celebrated with virtual events to share knowledge, skills and connections.
World Storytelling Day is a celebration of the art of oral storytelling, observed since 2003.. It is celebrated every year on the March equinox, on (or near) March 20th.
On this day, oral storytellers around the world are busy inspiring audiences, and creating community, by telling classical tales, local stories, glorious, horrendous, happy, challenging, spooky, romantic and dramatic epic stories. Some wrapped in music, some staged and others intimate – but every story is told in a unique and compelling way, by a storyteller whose heart is full of great tales to bridge our divides and remind us what it is to be human.
UNESCO proclaimed this date back in 1999.
On 21st March, World Poetry Day is celebrated every year to recognise the unique ability to make poetry and encourage people who are creative enough to capture life poetically.
World Poetry Day gives us a chance to revisit a favourite poem from childhood, exorcise a ghost from a school lesson or dive into some contemporary works.
Every year, at 8:30 pm on the last Saturday of March, millions of people across the world join in raising awareness of the issues facing our planet.
Started by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and partners as a symbolic lights-out event in Sydney in 2007, Earth Hour is now one of the world’s largest grassroots movements for the environment.
Each year, Earth Hour engages millions of people in more than 180 countries and territories, switching off their lights to show support for our planet.
But Earth Hour goes far beyond the symbolic action of switching off – it has become a catalyst for positive environmental impact, driving major legislative changes by harnessing the power of the people and collective action.
Earth Hour is open-source and everyone, anyone, is welcome to take part and help amplify our mission to unite people to protect our planet. https://youtu.be/fb5fDL1To9M
World Theatre Day helps in raising the importance of the art form of Theatre as well as other forms of talents. It also acts as a wakeup call for governments, politicians and institutions to recognise the value and significance of Theatre and also to bring forth the point of the potentiality of the art form to contribute to the state’s economic growth.
World Theatre Day was initiated in 1962 by the International Theatre Institute (ITI).
April Fool’s Day in History
Practical jokes and pranks date back to Ancient Roman times. Ancient Romans and Celts celebrated a festival of practical joking around the time of the March equinox.
The Origin of “Fool’s Errands”
According to Roman myth, the god Pluto abducted Proserpina to the underworld. Her mother Ceres only heard her daughter’s voice echo and searched for her in vain. The fruitless search is believed by some to have inspired the tradition of “fool’s errands”, practical jokes where people are asked to complete an impossible or imaginary task.
All Fool’s Day in British Folklore
British folklore links April Fool’s Day to the town of Gotham in Nottinghamshire. According to the legend, it was traditional in the 13th century for any road that the king placed his foot upon to become public property. So when Gotham’s citizens heard that King John planned to travel through their town, they refused him entry, not wishing to lose their main road. When the king heard this, he sent soldiers to the town. But when the soldiers arrived in Gotham, they found the town full of fools engaged in foolish activities such as drowning fish. As a result, the king declared the town too foolish to warrant punishment.
When is Good Friday?
Good Friday is observed on the Friday before Easter. The day commemorates the crucifixion and death of Jesus Christ.
What is Good Friday?
The most important events in Christianity are the death and later resurrection of Jesus Christ, who Christians believe is the Son of God, and whose life and teachings are the foundation of Christianity.
After the last supper, Jesus was arrested in the Garden of Gethsemane, put on trial, sentenced to death. He was then tied and nailed by the wrists and feet to a large wooden cross and left to die. This is why the cross is used as a symbol of the Christian faith.
Good Friday is a day of mourning. During special Good Friday services Christians meditate on Jesus’s suffering and death on the cross, and what this means for their faith.
Why is it called ‘Good Friday’?
At first glance, it seems a strange name for a day that marked such a terrible event as a crucifixion, but when we look at the origin of the name it becomes clearer… or it would if there was one origin that people could agree on. As it stands, you can take your pick from the following:
- Some say it comes from the use of “Good” as an adjective applied to the day, which is an Old English synonym for “holy.”
- Others believe it stems from a corruption of the word “God,” in much the same way that “Good Bye” comes from the phrase “God be with ye.” So the name may be derived from ‘God’s Friday’.
- Undoubtedly most Christians perceive the day as “good” because the message of Easter is of Christ’s victory over sin, death, and the devil. Indeed, the New Testament is also known as the Gospel, which is Greek for ‘Good News’.
Also, it also worth noting that this confusion over the name is mainly confined to Western European and North American Christians. Eastern Orthodox Christians call it “Great and Holy Friday. Around the rest of the world, it’s known as Holy Friday in most Latin nations, ‘Great Friday’ by the Slavic peoples, “Friday of Mourning” in Germany and “Long Friday” in Norway.
Good Friday Traditions
Many Church services are held in the afternoon, usually between noon to 3pm, to remember the hours when Jesus was crucified on the cross.
Some churches observe the day by re-enacting the process of the cross in the rituals of stations of the cross, which depicts the final hours of Jesus’ life. Other churches may participate in Veneration of the Cross, a short ceremony in which Christians kneel before the cross and affirm their faith.
In Jerusalem, Christians follow in Jesus’ footsteps and walk Via Dolorosa, the traditional path that led to the site of the crucifixion. Many who participate try to ritually bear the same weight Jesus did by carrying crosses on their backs.
Though it’s not a public holiday in the Vatican or Italy, the Pope will say a mass at the Vatican before leads an annual public prayer of the Stations of the Cross at the Colosseum in Rome. A procession is then made to the Palatine Hill, accompanied by a huge cross covered in burning torches.