Shhhhh I’m Just An Orchid Okay

There are two St. Patrick’s.

There’s the corned beef and cabbage, Irish-themed everything, drunken green nonsense version.

And then there’s the other one. The one who was kidnapped and sold as a slave into Ireland. After 6 years of slavery, he escaped.

When he later became a priest, he returned to Ireland. As a missionary. Beginning his ministry in the very place where he had labored as a slave.

This year I ended up spending some time with the other one.

Not because I have anything against drunken green nonsense. But because I was doing a little cleaning up and throwing out. And I found the box that my favorite rosary came in.

It’s a very Irish rosary. Each bead is a squarish piece of green Connemara marble. With a silver-plated chain.

One of the beads is long gone. Much of the silver has worn off. It’s well-loved and well-worn.

In the bottom of that very Irish box was a holy card. With a prayer, the Lorica. St. Patrick’s Breastplate.

It’s a long prayer. Here’s the part I keep coming back to. The part that hits home.

“Christ be with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me,

Christ within me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me,

Christ on my right, Christ on my left,

Christ where I lie, Christ where I sit, Christ where I arise,

Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me,

Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me,

Christ in every eye that sees me, Christ in every ear that hears me.”

It’s a prayer that reveals the heart of someone who didn’t give up on anyone. Even those who had done their worst to him.

It’s the prayer of someone who loved like Christ.

I think I need to spend more time with this Patrick.

If you feel embarrassed, that's a you problem. If others think "That's embarrassing", then they're embarrassed. So it's their problem.

"Is it embarrassing to...?" - well, that's either a you problem, and in that case you have to work through mental programming, or it's the problem of others and they have to work through things.

Nothing's ever embarrassing or cringe unless you want to make your life 100% harder on purpose.

From one horizon to the other, all across the black carpet of the night, were the stars—thousands of them, tens of thousands, in clusters and rivers of light. And in the quiet, her father said, "God made the world beautiful because He loves us."

That was more than sixty years ago.My friend grew up and learned all about entropy and supernovas and colliding galaxies and quantum mechanics and the general theory of relativity. But still, when she closes her eyes, she can see that carpet of stars and hear her father's voice: God made the world beautiful because He loves us. Creation is more than an accident of dead matter. It's a romance. It has purpose. It sings of the Living God. It bears His signature. And it's our home.”