Non-Christians- do you celebrate St. Patrick's Day?

I'm a Pagan/Wiccan and of Irish descent. I wear a solid red shirt to represent and remember the sacrifice that my ancestors (Irish and Pagan) made. I also wear a piece of jewelry that has a snake on it (I've got a couple of different pieces), since due to the metaphor that's what I am. It's always interested when someone notices it and realizes what it stands for on that day. I don't wear anything green and I don't celebrate St. Patrick on that day. I celebrate the ones that refused to convert and stayed true to themselves in the face of death.

For us, pagans of Irish ancestry, it is a day of rememberance, mourning, and a little celebration. We decorate with snakes and we set a place at the table to remind us of those who died. We have very small children and we let them hunt for shamrocks and talk about the coming spring ( we do this with eggs on Ostara and again on Easter). We do celebrate being Irish and the fact that after all the horrible things St. Patrick did (he did more than force religion on them, he slaughtered the Druids and burned the remaining sacred groves), he is remembered as a leprechaun, a pagan image. Ah, the sweet irony. Sometimes, we wear a little green, but we always wear a little black.

I like to celebrate it for my own reasons, like Christians do with the winter solstice.

I am Irish, and I don't even know that whole thing. I'm sure my uncle would though, as he is very very very very crazy about and into our irish heritage. He likes to speak of our last name as "Doyle Clan" and all that. Personally, I am happy to be who I am, but I don't think an entire day needs to be made about. And I don't think drinking the day away had anything to do with the original holiday.

I celebrate it for my heritage and not for my religion. As far as I am concerned St-Patrick could be a door mat and I would still celebrate. I am just proud to be IRISH no one ever says proud to be either Catholic or Protestant.......Ireland is a country not a religion, the day was chosen way back in the 1700's maybe then it was for religious purposes but today it has to do more with our Irish roots.

Any excuse to drink

i think of you're precise... the Irish could carry St. Patty's Day in basic terms for themselves, the Pagans get to have their solstice and and different traditions, and the Christians could could arise with their very own dates and traditions. for my area, i think of i visit tear-off the completed matzah ingredient and declare it is an atheist custom! lmao...

Of course they celebrate - Any excuse to get drunk, they never pass that up. Christians are told not to get drunk, so hopefully, they're not involved in the celebrations.

And for the record, saints are a Catholic thing, not Christian. I have never heard what St Patrick was about. I don't believe in worshiping people, I believe it goes against the Bible. Thus, it's not a Christian thing, but Catholic.

I unintentionally recognized it by accidentally wearing green today. It was kinda teal though, so maybe it doesn't count.

i dont

Geez, take all the fun out of it, will you? Guess I'll just have to have another beer to drown my sorrows....

Actually I don't but it wasn't for that reason. I am sure we celebrate a lot of holidays that we do not know what they originally represented.

i'm a christian so i don't know, but some of my friends are chatolics and they skip school when they celebrate St. patrick's day

greens not my color....

I think you are right. I have never liked the holiday and the way over the top excessive drinking that goes on. Of all the cultural groups in the world, nothing scares a girl more than a big group of drunk and rowdy white guys. I don't like New Year's either really for the same reason.

In Ireland the bars are all closed for St. Patrick's Day - but then it is a Catholic country and would celebrate such a thing as you describe in that manner.

Peace!

PS - what's funny is that some of these "any excuse to drink" folks are the same people who rant about Catholics and their Saints and how wrong that is. Is the contradiction that hard to see? I mean America has homogonized a Catholic Saint's feast day into some gross characterization of what a teenager thinks it is like to be a grown up and allowed to drink. Pub crawl buses that take 50 adult people to drink at 15 different bars in one night? Can you please just take a look at yourselves?

PPS - and for those who do not celebrate St. Patrick's Day for religious reasons, I wonder if you celebrate St. Valentine's Day.

There are NO snakes in Ireland.

I firmly believe that every holiday is a celebration of someone else's misfortune. If you dig deep enough you can find the "bad" in everything. But that doesn't mean you can't celebrate green beer, shamrocks and leprechauns, I'm pretty sure the pagans had no problem with the above! (and I mean that in the best possible way!)