36 Comments

• rose528 | Feb 18, 2013, 08:39 PM EST

  more men trying to run women's lives. just stay away from all those cults, catholics, christians all of the cults and you'll be alright. god has done nothing for the people on earth since and that's because THERE IS NO GOD NEVER WAS NEVER WILL BE

• jacersagain | Feb 04, 2013, 05:20 PM EST

  @ eiriamach, back in the 5th century AD (the times of St. Brigid et al), there was hardly any official declarations of saints by the then “Vatican”. The Vatican in the Rome we know today didn’t exist back then – there was no St. Peter’s Basilica, no Vatican State and no Congregation for the Causes of Saints and certainly no Roman Catholic Church... there was only the Christian Church spread through Europe. The original Church erected over St. Peter’s grave in his honour in the early Christian centuries, said to have been made mostly of timber, covered some of the ground now occupied by St. Peter’s Square, which was once a Roman circus or games arena, used for horse and chariot races, like today’s Piazza Navona and the Circus Maximus in Rome were once (as “erudited” from a British TV documentary).

• jacersagain | Feb 04, 2013, 05:17 PM EST

  Seanmor… it was a convent and a monastery, not a co-ed school. It was a place dedicated to prayer. The monks were cloistered in their own quarters and the nuns in theirs but all reputedly celebrated Mass together. @ Gearoid4, thanks for kind comments but I hardly think myself erudite! Your own posts are far more studiously enlightening and my thanks to you for posting them.

• Seanmor | Feb 03, 2013, 12:59 PM EST

  It is said that Brigid ran a co-ed school in Kildare, which woould have put her centuries ahead of her time. At this side of the pond there are many church's that bear her name, but the one in NYC's lower Eastside is very lucky to be still standing, despite Cardinal Egan's strong desire to demolish it.

• Gearoid4 | Feb 03, 2013, 09:51 AM EST

  Thanks for your very erudite contributions, Jacers as they are very much appreciated. St Brigid was never formally canonized by the Vatican but she is fully recognized as a saint by both the Catholic and Orthodox Churches. In the 2004 edition of the Roman Martyrology, Brigid is listed under 1 February with the Latin name Brígidae. I think that the feast day of St Brigid is listed within the national calender of Ireland by the Irish episcopate with the permission of the Holy See. She has been omitted from the general Roman Calender not due to any malicious intent but rather because of the vast number of existing Saints that are listed there already.

• eiriamach | Feb 03, 2013, 06:45 AM EST

  Niall writes, "the stories of her good deeds and extraordinary acts ensured she was canonized well before most of her contemporaries." When was Brigid canonized? I suppose you could say she was "canonized" as virtually all saints from the island of saints and scholars were "canonized," i.e., by the acclamation of the people, but certainly not by the Vatican. In fact, about a half-century ago, the Vatican officially pronounced her life undocumented and decreed therefore Brigid herself would never be officially canonized (like Patrick and Colm Cille). They're not sure she ever lived or that there's any truth to the legends about her. Not that it matters what they think! I doubt she'd wish to be a selling point for today's Roman Church.

• jacersagain | Feb 02, 2013, 09:34 PM EST

  (My final say on this to PaMa) I have to say this to PatriciaMarya: Thank you so, so so very much for sharing your experience with St. Brigid and her straw Cross with all who read ICentral. It proves that St. Brigid, like St. Patrick, like St. Keteri and St. Mary MacKillop haven’t gone away, you know, despite the time since their human deaths and can still reach out to every one of us. You, I, and many others are blessed to know that. Thanks to you, Patricia, the memory of the everlasting flame of the love that St. Brigid has for you and our Christ, which you found in an isolated church’s altar to the Lamb of God, Our Lord, is alive, well and flourishing. Thank you so much. Like meself, I don’t think you will ever appreciate enough the enormity of the contribution of your simple question has been on Irish Central and my simple, fekkin, long-winded answer. Again, my thanks to you PaMa, and to St. Brigid for finding you, and for her re-finding me, through you, on Irish Central.

• jacersagain | Feb 02, 2013, 09:29 PM EST

  Dem flipping ditto doubling posts agin! (More for PaMara and others…) There, also in the legion of Saints, canonised or not, are the 14 ordinary Irish men and women (i.e. ordinary fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, sons, daughters and single people in different parishes) of Ireland who were of the many who persevered to keep the faith alive in Ireland during the Penal Laws time, who gave up their lives for that (for that read “murdered by British Crown Forces for refusing to tell where Masses were being held or where a priest might be found in a secret hideaway” ), who were blessed a few years ago in St. Peter’s Square - no official feast days for them either, but many of us Irish Catholics remember them every day in thanks for keeping the #Faith of Our Fathers # (and Mothers) alive for us to be privileged to have today. Likewise, St. Kateri Tekakwitha, the first Native American Indian female saint, has a feast-day celebrated only in America but I don’t know the date. I’d bet there’s a lot of feather-waving, whooping, dancing and beating drums celebrating her on whatever day it is – and rightfully so – just as we Irish do the same, in celebrating the privilege of having our faith in Jesus Christ renewed each St. Patrick’s Day. (One final say to PatriciaMarya… )

• jacersagain | Feb 02, 2013, 09:19 PM EST

  (More for PaMara and others… it always gets me goat up as to why we use abbreviations when the word ‘abbreviation’ itself is so long for typing out) Anyways, PaMara, for examples of local saints whose feast-days are revered in their own countries but not on the RC Church’s official calendar of saint days (and that’s without adding the saints of RCC-conjoined Catholic Churches), you have Saint Mary MacKillop, Australia’s first and only saint (as of now, more to come) who was once excommunicated by Vatican rules but was canonised by the same rules reverted just a few years ago, 2009 or 2010 (I’m not sure of which), who is not on the official Church calendar of Saints’ feast days - but she is officially celebrated in Australia on 8th August (Seanomelb, note that date in yr diary). (More for PaMa (oops! there goes dem fekkin abreevos again!) and others…)

• jacersagain | Feb 02, 2013, 09:10 PM EST

  (More for PaMara and others… it always gets me goat up as to why we use abbreviations when the word ‘abbreviation’ itself is so long for typing out) Anyways, PaMara, for examples of local saints whose feast-days are revered in their own countries but not on the RC Church’s official calendar of saint days (and that’s without adding the saints of RCC-conjoined Catholic Churches), you have Saint Mary MacKillop, Australia’s first and only saint (as of now, more to come) who was once excommunicated by Vatican rules but was canonised by the same rules reverted just a few years ago, 2009 or 2010 (I’m not sure of which), who is not on the official Church calendar of Saints’ feast days - but she is officially celebrated in Australia on 8th August (Seanomelb, note that date in yr diary). (More for PaMa (oops! there goes dem fekkin abreevos again!) and others…)

• jacersagain | Feb 02, 2013, 08:55 PM EST

  (…more for PatriciaMarya …) However, each country in the world, like Ireland, the Vatican recognises the right of each person in each country to keep holy, to honour and to celebrate the feast days of local saints like Ireland’s Saints Brigid (Feb 1st), Patrick (March 17th), Colmcille (aka Columba, 9th June), the navigating St Brendan (May 16th), the hermit St. Kevin of beautiful Glendalough in Wicklow (June 3rd) and the martyr-Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of All Ireland (the seat of the present-day Irish Cardinal Brady) St. Oliver Plunkett (July 1st), whose skull you can see in St. Peter’s Church in Drogheda, Co. Louth, south of the “Border” in Ireland (note that, IrelandNorth). Not all of them have big celebratory parades every year… and thanks be ta jaysus for that, I say, otherwise we’d get no work done anywhere in Ireland! (More for PatMary and others, (Patricia, pls pardon the abbreviation; I’ll go with PaMara for now ‘cos me typing fingers are aching…)

• jacersagain | Feb 02, 2013, 08:46 PM EST

  @ PatriciaMarya – Nice story of you finding St. Brigid’s Cross on the altar in the west of Ireland on that sad occasion of yours, thanks for sharing it, much to my delight and, I’m sure, to the delight of other ICentral readers and contributors. Yr question… No, St. Brigid's Sainthood has not been rescinded by the Vatican. But actually, like St. Patrick’s feast-day, her feast-day was dropped from the official world-wide list of Church feast days’ calendar not long ago, simply because there aren't enough days in the calendar year to fit in all the canonised saints, including recently-declared saints. As far as I know, the RC Church officially wraps up honouring them all, each year, on 1st November, the Holy feast day of All Saints Day; perhaps Gearoid4 or Carroll09 could perhaps get back to us to expand on that. (More for PatriciaMarya …)

• jacersagain | Feb 02, 2013, 04:14 PM EST

  Thanks IrelandNorth for the 'border'-line “correction” and the chuckle on Mother Sinéad! I only refer to Nth or Sth Ireland on ICentral for the benefit of IC readers outside of Ireland. Downpatrick is, after all, located in a part of Ireland governed by another country. But to me, Dublin-born like Lord Edward Carson was, all of Ireland is my beloved country as it was for Brigid, Patrick and Colmcille.

• PatriciaMarya | Feb 02, 2013, 04:14 PM EST

  I can't believe my great fortune because back in 2010, I travelled to Ireland, the West, for the first time to assist a pal in finding a retirement home and to cast my Mom's ashes. I got to visit a church that had the Straw Cross on its altar and got to read and to revere Brigid. For some reason, I had been told that the Vatican, in its infinite wisdom, had rescinded Bridid's Sainthood! Is this true? Please help me find out this fact.

• IrelandNorth | Feb 02, 2013, 01:52 PM EST

  jacersagain! County Kildare is in eastern Ireland (ie Leinster). Your too preoccupied with that increasingly insiginficant meridian line drawn by insecure planter stock way back when. WIth the crumbling Holy Roman Empire, perhaps their a marketing opportunity for a reformation of a divine feminine church. Is Mother Sinéad available?

• curtisjohnson | Feb 02, 2013, 10:59 AM EST

  In any event, a positive figure contra to toxic anglo-materialism.

• Joe Glackin | Feb 02, 2013, 12:18 AM EST

  I always thought they got equal reverence by the fact these two Saints were always taught to us. I dont feel that using one or other,depending on gender applies.St Bridgid was a healing ,non judgmental, understanding Saint. She was a refuge for women in need. To separate her in terms of applying to women deepens any divisions through old mindsets.Her life is an example to all men and women to follow

• Searlit | Feb 01, 2013, 07:55 PM EST

  Dia dhuit a jacersagain! Hopefully I will be able to visit Ireland and see St. Brigid's Well. I find all the ancient history fascinating. I have read that there have been St. Brigid's of succeeding generations that literally carried the torch for the original abbess. I mean they kept the eternal flame going. I understand that the original Brigid was the Goddess of fire (the hearth). Really interesting.

• jacersagain | Feb 01, 2013, 06:24 PM EST

  Dunno how the double post happened... apologies, it t'wasn't my fawlt.. weeely. Oh no it wasn't... oh yes it was!... Oh shut up! I'm glad I'm using my old trusty laptop... You know those cheap phones you can get for your kids that keep them in touch with you but stop them getting onto the internet and all its badness while running up bills on you? Well, not for me the new iTouchpad allegedly invented by Apple for kids to stop huge parent bills called the iTouchKidspad. I dread to think who might have bought it...

• jacersagain | Feb 01, 2013, 06:06 PM EST

  (…more) But if you want to visit St. Brigid’s grave and pray to her for her intercession before our Christ the King in your life's troubles, you will have to travel to Downpatrick, located in the beautiful Mourne Mountains in County Down in Nth Ireland, where her remains lie under a giant stone marking the final resting place of the remains of Saints Patrick, Brigid and Colmcille, the so-called trinity of founders of Christianity in Ireland. You will get a triple blessing in one 'cos... Legend has it that there was a prophecy that these three saints, who were buried in different parts of Ireland, would one day be united in one grave – and so it happened (you can find out how that happened, historically, when you get there). As one ancient poetic account says “In Down, three saints one grave do fill, Patrick, Brigid and Columcille”.

• jacersagain | Feb 01, 2013, 05:57 PM EST

  (…more) But if you want to visit St. Brigid’s grave and pray to her for her intercession in your life's troubles, you will have to travel to Downpatrick, located in the beautiful Mourne Mountains in County Down in Nth Ireland, where her remains lie under a giant stone marking the final resting place of the remains of Saints Patrick, Brigid and Colmcille, the so-called trinity of founders of Christianity in Ireland. You will get a triple blessing in one 'cos... Legend has it that there was a prophecy that these three saints, who were buried in different parts of Ireland, would one day be united in one grave – and so it happened (you can find out how it happened, historically, when you get there). As one ancient poetic account says “In Down, three saints one grave do fill, Patrick, Brigid and Columcille”.

• jacersagain | Feb 01, 2013, 05:49 PM EST

  @ Searlit 11.37am – Yes, that statue is in County Kildare, Sth Ireland, where St. Brigid founded a convent and monastery. Legend has it that she lit a candle, a flame to honour Christ, the everlasting Redeemer, and asked for the flame to be kept everlastingly alive (like they do in under the Arc de Triomphe in Paris and in the USA’s Arlington Graveyard in honour of fallen soldiers of all wars). The photo is of her statue holding an everlasting burning flame (not an ice cream cone, as handsome68 imagines, though I’m pretty sure Brigid enjoyed the odd ice-cream of her day) but if you visit Kildare and St. Brigid’s ancient convent/monastery place, you will find an actual, live flickering flame burning there still, just as in Paris and Arlington. (More…)

• jacersagain | Feb 01, 2013, 05:47 PM EST

  There is a lot of information around in Ireland and on the internet about St. Brigid of Ireland; most of it written down from traditional, handed-down-through-the-centuries vocal stories of St. Brigid (like the traditional vocal stories of St. Nicholas (in Latin, San Nicolas), the secret gift-giver, all wrapped up as today’s Santa Claus). Like many people in Ireland, I continue to have a St. Brigid’s Cross, made of straw as made by St. Brigid, over my home’s entrance door – to greet visitors coming into my house and to bless them as they leave, as St. Brigid wished for all.

• irishpjk | Feb 01, 2013, 05:06 PM EST

  I am a bit surprised you did not mention that when Bridget received her vows the wrong one was read and she was ordained a Bishop, when it was realized what had happened it was too late for change. This might be a myth but it was passed on to me as fact.

• irishpjk | Feb 01, 2013, 05:06 PM EST

  I am a bit surprised you did not mention that when Bridget received her vows the wrong one was read and she was ordained a Bishop, when it was realized what had happened it was too late for change. This might be a myth but it was passed on to me as fact.

• irishpjk | Feb 01, 2013, 05:06 PM EST

  I am a bit surprised you did not mention that when Bridget received her vows the wrong one was read and she was ordained a Bishop, when it was realized what had happened it was too late for change. This might be a myth but it was passed on to me as fact.

• irishpjk | Feb 01, 2013, 04:58 PM EST

  wtf. I have not been getting Irish Central email for a while now, I happened to mention it someone his reply was, “you must be disagreeing with them, maybe pointing a few facts that did not fit the real story” Now I ask could that be true? I always thought you would be looking for truth in media not just what agreed with your political view. Was I wrong? I guess I better play along, great story I love every word of it so well written and shure she was Irish and God knows where that Patrick buck came from, more, write more you can change the world.

• Cyn | Feb 01, 2013, 04:19 PM EST

  Irish women should read further than church teachings and follow the original Brighid, daughter of Dagda of the Tuatha d Dannun. She was the magickal one, the one the monastery was founded for and the path to the well still bears non christian symbols.

• oaklongan | Feb 01, 2013, 04:17 PM EST

  Thank You, Niall! And NJGK01. Also Susan Byron's illuminating researched history of and ancient and pre-medieval 'Brigid. Way to begin this Day...

• NJGK01 | Feb 01, 2013, 03:17 PM EST

  An increasing number of ‘lost’ books and records (more accurately long hidden from destruction and then forgotten) of the historical Brigid of Kildare have surfaced over the last two or three years and it’s readily apparent that the life, work and memory of the actual Brigid is a serious victim that was nearly wiped out by centuries of sacking, invaders and occupation (as was Gaelic itself too). As I find access to these books and records that detail the historical lady of Kildare and read more about her, I find it saddening and frustrating that such oppression and systematic destruction took one of the extraordinary women of early Ireland and very nearly erased it to the point ‘popular culture’ believe Saint Brigid is the goddess Brigid and not a young lady named after the deity who devoted herself to Christianity. Hopefully, as with the focused dedication to preserve and resurrect the Irish language, there will be dedication to bringing Brigid back too so future generations can preserve the memory of this great woman of early Ireland. Gene King

• PhlutiePhan | Feb 01, 2013, 02:32 PM EST

  So, now you will use Brigid to destroy the Catholic Church. Hillary and the bois are clever but not clever enough to turn Brigid into a supporter of abortion and gay rights.

• WoundedKnee | Feb 01, 2013, 01:45 PM EST

  Good article, but should have been updated and expanded since it first appeared. There are lots of pretty traditions and folklore connected with St Bridget. The sad part is that the Irish no longer know them. For a culture to live it needs to be transferred from parents to child. If the parents don't know anything, there's nothing to transfer. That's what has happened in Ireland. I have always thought the Irish government should stop the waste of time of teaching Irish in the high schools, and instead devise an Irish culture curriculum, which would include things like St Bridget and the myths and lore associated with her.

• Searlit | Feb 01, 2013, 11:37 AM EST

  For those of you who know nothing about St. Brigid, that's a burning torch she's holding. There is an eternal flame at her well, from what I have read. She acted with kindness and compassion to all. A good role model for everyone to follow. I think the picture is taken from St. Brigid's Well in Kildare. It looks beautiful. Sláinte!

• smallvillenyc | Feb 01, 2013, 10:50 AM EST

  If we do celebrate it, make it in July when Weather is a Little Less Blustery!! :)

• johnshiel | Feb 01, 2013, 10:40 AM EST

  cool looking statue and site in photo; where would it be?

• handsome68 | Feb 01, 2013, 09:46 AM EST

  Nice ice cream cone, or whatever, she has in her hand in the photo.