During the past few weeks, a Martian wandering the aisles of Park Pharmacy, CVS, Wal-Mart or Krogers might well have assumed that humans in Goshen go only for green. Indeed, all earthlings, tomorrow, are Irish--color-coordinated in clothing, ribbons, beverages, greeting cards, nail polish and eye-shadow--and, even more so, in sentiment. It takes a St. Patrick to raise a consciousness. Each year in some mysterious fashion he restores and liberates us during the ambiguous days of a lingering winter season.
St. Patrick's universal appeal calls for a bit of reflection. How does an obscure monk out of the Dark Ages wield so wide an influence? Here, with a view toward our present moment in history, are a few observations:
1. Unassimilated for centuries, the Irish have always marched to a different drummer. Out at the dark edge of Europe, their sun did set on the Roman empire, and, subsequently, on a Mother Church. Their patron saint--whom we also instinctively claim as our own--was a strikingly effective freelance missionary unencumbered by home-office bureaucracy. Patrick's pragmatic freedom still appeals to those of us burdened by responsibility.
2. Patrick's mission to the Irish was uncomplicated and direct. A Christian lad abducted into Ulster slavery by Irish pirates, he felt called after his escape home to England to return and convert his Celtic masters to the faith that gave up vengeance for forgiveness. What is now being rediscovered as "Celtic spirituality" originated in a gospel of shalom, of peace. Peacemakers resonate with Patrick.
3. Other-than-Irish people around the world find on The Day that it feels good to flourish a bit of green. Such identity-by-association provides a psychological home-base for disaffiliated strangers in our postmodern era. Once a year, at least, we can all reaffirm our membership in Patrick's world-wide shamrock society.
4. St. Patrick's Day centers on a powerful symbol that strikes us with immediate conviction. Patrick effectively used the lowly shamrock to explain to skeptical heathen kings the mystery of the Trinity. When we pop a shamrock cookie or slurp a Shamrock Shake, we subliminally do so in remembrance of that winsome Irish spiritual hero, fully engaged in his world, who we in our setting would aspire to be.
There is, unfortunately, a dark side, also characteristic of the Irish psyche. Ireland, not only today but for centuries, has been a land of Troubles. As W. B. Yeats incisively put it, "Great hatred, little room." Even in Dublin's St. Patrick's Cathedral, now a privileged venue for ecumenical worship, shared communion is still rare and controversial. More notorious are the Catholic-Protestant counter-claims for St. Patrick's exclusive political blessing, a vestige of the tribal my-god-can-lick-your-god mentality that breeds violence.
Tomorrow, on a stragetically selected March 17th, President Clinton meets in Washington with the principal negotiators in the precarious Northern Ireland peace process. Even within the context of a stereotypically bibilous festival, no great progress is predicted. Following the recent collapse in implementation of what was a remarkable self-governing Easter Agreement, the respective parties are trying to pick their way through a rubble of sectarian mistrust and recrimination. Among the ups and downs of hope in recent years, the present moment is definitely a low one. All sides fear that, given time, down may slide on down toward disaster. Unsettling as it was in 1997 for the latest group of Goshen College students in Belfast to walk past swiveled guns mounted on army landrovers, the situation in Northern Ireland held some promise. The Agreement did evolve. But right now the peace process seems badly stuck.
Paradoxically, the different parties to the conflict profess in all sincerity to have inherited St. Patrick's best qualities--winsome persuasion, openness to compromise, devotion, risk, courage, creative symbol management, ideological idealism--while at the same time they declaim heart-felt slogans like "No Surrender!", "Never Disarm!", or simply "No!" Outright conflict, though it may not always be transformable, is usually amenable to resolution. Entrenched cultural paradox, however--in politics, religion, literature, and the arts--is a harder nut to crack.
That, nevertheless, is the fundamental challenge. In Ireland, as in Kosovo, the West Bank, or Rwanda, we can learn much by listening and watching and trying to grasp a bit of what no sensible person anywhere presumes to fully understand. In that learning mode, as sensitive, receptive inquirers we achieve rapport with persons in all walks of Irish life. Intellectually disciplined, empathetic and supportive, we can, in the comprehensive, reconciliatory spirit of St. Patrick, be a plus for their future and our own.
March 16, 2000
Comments about this article may be e-mailed to: John Fisher, peacecenter@tln.net
HTML editing by Lon Sherer, lonhs@goshen.edu
Published: 3/00
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