It is very hard to ignore the complaints of religious organizations when they speak out against how holidays that were actually established by the Catholic religion are being taken over by things the Papacy stands so firmly against. If you’ll look at a holiday like Saint Patrick’s for instance, you’ll see that it no longer even vaguely resembles the honor and stiff religious prestige it once did. Now the day in question is nothing but a revelry of raucous behavior in silly Irish shirts.

The Catholic Church holds Saint Patrick in especially high esteem. The entire island nation of Ireland was once dominated by a Celtic people who worshiped their own ancestors and a multitude of gods that demanded sacrifice and war. Saint Patrick was a holy man who traveled back to Ireland after escaping captivity there solely for the purpose of converting the population. Now, Ireland is mostly stalwart Catholics because of him. If you were Catholic, wouldn’t the drunkenness and goofy Irish tshirts bother you?

Who really goes out to pray and attend services on March 17th these days? When the kids fill up the bars and pubs with their crazy costumes and Saint Patrick’s Day Irish tee shirts, do you think they are really paying homage to a Saint who has been dead for hundreds of years? The holiday is nothing like it once was. Considering the lack of education in this country, I would be honestly surprised if most of the youth even knows who Saint Patrick was.

While I know for a fact that Catholicism would love nothing more than to throw the brakes on and halt the progress into secular debauchery that St. Patrick’s Day is hurtling towards, I fear that the train is now officially out of control. Stopping kids from going out and throwing back green beer in those cheap Irish tee shirts is not possible any more. The church would have to instill something resembling reverence, and we are certainly no longer a reverential people.

As far as I am concerned, you can rock out in your drinking Irish tshirts all night long on Saint Patrick’s Day. Not only am I not really all that religious by nature, but I am very likely to be right next to you at the bar ordering a pint of green beer with you. What I do suggest, however, is that you take just a minute of your precious time to look up the historical facts concerning this holiday that we have butchered through the years. It’s not so much to request, really. It might give you something interesting to talk about between shots of whiskey.