The Contemporary Saint

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Ireland has long honored St. Patrick, as have many in Europe and elsewhere, often by wearing green and drinking pints. Now, the country is moving to honor another saintly figure from its past – St. Brigid of Kildare – by creating an official holiday starting on Monday, the Associated Press reported.

St. Brigid of Kildare, a younger contemporary of the more famous St. Patrick, whose holiday began some 120 years ago, founded a “church of the oak,” or “cill dara” in Irish in the fifth century. Her deeds gave the name to the town of Kildare, where she was a prominent abbess of a monastic settlement of men and women.

The new holiday, to fall on the first Monday of February and the first in Ireland to honor a woman, celebrates the saint and also Imbolc, an ancient pagan holy day linked with the goddess Brigid – with whom the saint shares a name and attributes – and the coming of spring.

In Celtic mythology, Brigid was a triple goddess – of healing, fire, and poetry – and the Christian saint who took her name, born in 450 AD, carried some of those same associations as the patron saint of poets and midwives, according to the government of Ireland.

Devotees associate Brigid, and the goddess, with embodying women’s empowerment, environmental care and peacemaking in Ireland. Some Irish have described St. Brigid as the country’s “matron saint” and a symbol “that speaks to the really cutting-edge issues” of modern times.

Her holiday comes as many Irish are starting to reject traditional Roman Catholicism amid cover-ups of sexual abuse and other scandals.

At the same time, the celebration also starts the countdown to the 1,500th anniversary of Brigid’s death in 2024, which will be commemorated by a conference and other events.