Sir, – Maria Steen makes a valid point about the lack of recognition of our Christian heritage in our St Patrick’s Day celebrations (“St Patrick’s Day is a celebration of everything other than Christianity,” Opinion, March 17th).
We must recognise that 1,500 years of Christianity (overwhelmingly Catholic in Ireland) has contributed to our Irish value system that espouses love, care, neighbourliness, fairness, forgiveness and connectedness in the Irish people in general.
We have scant evidence of what the previous 1,500-plus years of Druidic, Celtic “pagan” Irishness has contributed. That Irish values correspond markedly with Christian values must be acknowledged.
However, I do cringe at the mention of the holy day of obligation, which harks back to my childhood in the 1950s where the Catholic Church in this country was authoritarian and rules based, with no mention of Jesus’s prime message to “love one another as I have loved you.”
RM Block
We must differentiate between St Patrick’s Day as a celebration of the man himself, and the public holiday that is fixed on that same date.
The public holiday is our day to celebrate who we are as a people and a nation. We can embrace who we are as Irish people, including the wannabe Irish, our immigrants who choose to belong here and our diaspora. If this extends to some seamróg-ery, I say bring it on. – Yours, etc,
TOM STEPHENS,
Naas,
Co Kildare.
