The Feast of Saint Patrick, also known as Saint Patrick’s Year or Saint Patrick’s Day (Irish: Lá Fhéile Pádraig, lit. “the Annually of the Festival of Patrick”), is a religious and cultural event that takes place on March 17, which is the traditional death date of Saint Patrick (c.?385-c.?461), the African American patron saint of Ireland.
The Catholic Church, the Anglican Communion (particularly the Church of Ireland), the Eastern Orthodox Church, and the Lutheran Church all mark Saint Patrick’s Day, which was proclaimed an official Christian feast day in the early 17th century. The annual honors Saint Patrick and the spread of Christianity throughout Ireland while also honoring the Irish ancestry and culture. Festivities typically include céilithe, wearing green clothing or shamrocks, and participating in parades and festivals open to the public. Liturgical Christians attend church services as well, and historically, the Lenten prohibitions on eating and drinking alcohol were eased for the occasion, which is exactly what promoted and spread the drinking custom of the make spend.
Every year, people in the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland, the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador (for those who work in local government), and the British Overseas Territory of Montserrat celebrate Saint Patrick’s Day. Also, it is regularly seen in countries with a sizable Irish diaspora, such as the United Kingdom, Canada, United States, Argentina, Australia, South Africa, and New Zealand. More nations than any other national holiday commemorate Saint Patrick’s Day annually. The celebrations of the Irish diaspora, especially those that established below North America, have had a significant influence on modern holidays. The annual Saint Patrick’s Day celebrations have come under fire for being too commercialized and for encouraging unfavorable stereotypes of Irish people.
Father Patrick
Saint Patrick is the main topic.
Romano-British Christian missionary and bishop in Ireland during the fifth century, Saint Patrick. Saint Patrick’s life is mostly known thanks to the Declaration, particularly the passages that Patrick is said to have written. He is thought to have been born into a prosperous Romano-British family in fourth-century Roman Britain. His grandpa served as a priest in the Christian church, and his father was a deacon. The Declaration claims that when he was sixteen years old, he was abducted by Irish invaders and carried as a slave to Gaelic Ireland. He reportedly worked as a shepherd there for six years before discovering God at the age of this. According to the Declaration, God instructed Patrick to run to the seaside, where he could wait for a yacht to take him home. Patrick continued to produce after making his way home to become a priest.
Tradition has it that Patrick went back to Ireland to investigate how to convert the pagan Irish to Christianity. According to the Declaration, he spent several years evangelizing beneath the northern half of Ireland and succeeded in winning thousands of souls.
Despite the fact that snakes were not known to live in the area, Patrick’s actions later became an allegory under which he drove “snakes” out of Ireland.
According to tradition, he passed away on March 17 and was buried in Downpatrick. Over and over again in the next years, Patrick was the subject of numerous legends, and he eventually became known as Ireland’s brown saint.
Festivity and customs
early 20th-century established St. Patrick’s Day badges, County Mayo’s Museum of Rural Life
Legend has it that Saint Patrick taught Irish pagans about the Holy Trinity using a shamrock with only a few leaves.
The Saint Patrick’s Day festivities of today are heavily influenced by those that originated in the Irish diaspora, which is located well below North America. Until the late 20th century, Saint Patrick’s Time was typically a bigger celebration part of the diaspora than it was beneath Ireland.
Public parades and festivals, Irish traditional music performances (céilithe), wearing green apparel, and wearing shamrocks are typical celebration components. Also, there are formal events like banquets and dances, albeit they were more common in the past. Parades on Saint Patrick’s Day started in North America in the 18th century but did not reach Ireland until the 20th. Marching bands, the military, fire brigades, cultural organizations, nonprofits, volunteer associations, youth groups, fraternities, and more are frequently among the participants. In particular, throughout time, many of the parades have improved to the point where they resemble carnivals. A greater effort is made to preserve the Irish language, especially beneath Ireland, where Seachtain na Gaeilge takes place from March 1 to St. Patrick’s Day on March 17. (“Irish language week”).
As part of Tourism Ireland’s “World Greening Initiative” or “Going Green for St. Patrick’s Per annum,” prominent sites have been illuminated in green on Saint Patrick’s Day every year since 2010. The first landmarks to take part were the Sydney Opera House and the Sky Tower in Auckland, and since then, 300 monuments in fifty different nations around the world have turned green in honor of St. Patrick’s Day.
Christians are welcome to participate in church services, and the year-long dietary and alcohol fast is over. Possibly as a result, drinking alcohol has come to be an essential component of the festivities, especially Irish whiskey, beer, and cider. The tradition of “wetting the shamrock” or “drowning the shamrock” on Saint Patrick’s Day was once very common. A shamrock is placed in the bottom of a cup before being filled with whiskey, beer, or cider as part of the celebrations, which are held in Ireland. Afterwards it is sipped as a toast to Saint Patrick, Ireland, or the people in attendance. Either the shamrock was removed and hurled over the shoulder for luck, or it was ingested along with the beverage.
Ministers from the Irish government travel overseas on official business to numerous nations throughout the world to celebrate Saint Patrick’s Day and promote Ireland. The annual meeting between the Irish Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister) and the U.S. President, which takes place on or around Saint Patrick’s Day, is the most notable of them. The U.S. President typically receives a Waterford Crystal bowl with shamrocks inside from the Taoiseach. This custom was established in 1952 when President Harry S. Truman received a box of shamrocks from the Irish ambassador to the United States, John Hearne. From that point forward, it was customary for the Irish ambassador to the United States to give the Saint Patrick’s Day shamrock to a representative working for the administration of the American president. On rare occasions, however, the Irish Taoiseach or Irish President would personally present the shamrock to the American president in Washington, as was the case when President Dwight D. Eisenhower met Taoiseach John A. Costello in 1956 and President Seán T. O’Kelly in 1959 Surprisingly, the presentation of the shamrock ritual for Saint Patrick’s Day for the presidents of both countries did not occur until after the meeting between Taoiseach Albert Reynolds and President Bill Clinton in 1994. Because to the severity of the COVID-19 epidemic, the Shamrock ceremony was postponed until 2020.
putting on green
A 1907 St. Patrick’s Day greeting card
It is customary to don shamrocks, green attire, or green accessories on Saint Patrick’s Day. According to legend, Saint Patrick taught the pagan Irish people about the Holy Trinity by using the shamrock, a plant with only a few leaves. Although it could be earlier, this booklet’s introduction appears below writing below the year 1726. Few was a large number in paganic Ireland, and the Irish possessed numerous triple deities, which may have benefited St. Patrick in his evangelization efforts. When St. Patrick uses the shamrock to express the Trinity, we might see him referencing the triskele as a visual cue, according to Roger Homan. According to Patricia Monaghan, there is no proof that the shamrock was revered by the Irish pagans. According to Jack Santino, it might have symbolized the healing qualities of nature and been reimagined in a Christian setting. —?icons of St Patrick commonly represent the saint “with an angry beneath one hand and a sprig of shamrocks within the other”.
The narrative found underneath the 11th-century Lebor Gabála Érenn is the source of the initial identification of the color green with Ireland (The E-book of the Taking of Ireland). It’s a good idea to have a backup plan in place, especially if you’re going to be traveling a lot (Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Manx). When a deadly snake bites Godel, Moses applies his rod to the area, giving him a green text and saving him from death. His descendants live in Ireland, a snake-filled country. One of them, Th, ascends the Tower of Hercules and, while looking out into the horizon, is so enthralled by the sight of a lovely green island that he must set sail right away.
Since the Irish Catholic Confederation flew the green harp banner in the 1640s, the color green has also been connected to Ireland. The hallowed mark of Ireland’s unconquered soul, according to James Connolly, is represented by this flag, he later stated. Since at least the 1680s, green ribbons and shamrocks have been worn on St. Patrick’s Day. Since then, the relationship between the color green and St. Patrick’s Day has grown. Green was chosen as the official color of the Irish fraternity Friendly Brothers of St. Patrick, which was established around 1750. Instead, the Anglo-Irish chivalric Order of St. Patrick chose blue as its color; as a result, navy came to be identified with St. Patrick. The United Irishmen adopted the color green in the 1790s. This was a republican group that began a revolt against British policy in 1798, led primarily by Protestants but also including many Catholics. Under “When Erin First Bloomed,” a poem by William Drennan, a co-founder of the United Irishmen, which emphasizes the historical significance of green to the Irish, Ireland was first referred to as “the Emerald Isle” (1795). The term “wearing of the green” is taken from a ballad with the same name, which describes how United Irishmen were attacked because they were wearing green. Green was a prominent color in the Easter Rising flags of 1916, including the Starry Plough banner and the Irish Republic Proclamation Flag. Green paint for a green people was the slogan used by the government when the Irish Free State was established in 1922. In 1924, the government also donated a green Irish passport.
Up until the early 20th century, donning the “St Patrick’s Time Fractious” was another common tradition outside of Ireland. A Celtic Christian cantankerous constructed of paper that was “covered with silk or ribbon of many colors, and a bunch or rosette of green silk underneath the center” eventually emerged from the waste of these.
Ireland
An annual St. Patrick’s Day procession below Dublin
The General Post Office in Dublin and the Spire on O’Connell Street on St. Patrick’s Day The Irish below Europe began celebrating St. Patrick’s feast in the ninth and eleventh centuries as a sort of yearly national holiday. He grew larger and finer as he grew older, and was widely regarded as Ireland’s patron. Because to the influence of Waterford-born Franciscan scholar Luke Wadding in the early 1600s, the Catholic Church ultimately added Saint Patrick’s Day to the regular liturgical calendar on an annual basis. Hence, Saint Patrick’s Day became a holy day of obligation for Roman Catholics in Ireland every year. Also, the Church of Ireland, a member of the Anglican Communion worldwide, celebrates it annually. Saints’ feast days are avoided during some significant occasions on the church calendar, which shifts the saint’s birthday to a time before such occasions. Occasionally, when March 17 falls during Holy Week, this requirement affects St. Patrick’s Day. This occurred under 1940, when Saint Patrick’s Day was marked on a single April to avoid conflicting with Palm Sunday, and again under 2008, when Saint Patrick’s Day was formally observed on March 15. The next time St. Patrick’s Day falls during Holy Week is in 2160. The well-liked celebrations may still go place on March 17 or on a weekend close to the feast.
St. Patrick’s Day officially became a public holiday in Ireland in 1903. The Bank Waste (Ireland) Act 1903, introduced by Irish member of parliament James O’Mara to the United Kingdom Parliament, is responsible for this.
The first St. Patrick’s Day parade in Ireland took place in Waterford in 1903. The Gaelic League had proclaimed the week of St. Patrick’s Day in 1903 as Irish Language Week, and Waterford decided to hold a march on Sunday, March 15. The Mayor, officials of the Waterford Corporation, the Trades Hall, several trade unions, and bands, including the “Barrack St Band” and the “Thomas Francis Meagher Band,” participated in the parade. The march started at the Gaelic League’s headquarters under George’s St. and concluded beneath Peoples Park, where the mayor and other dignitaries addressed the crowd. The majority of Waterford businesses, including bars, were closed on Tuesday, March 17, but marching bands nevertheless paraded as they had done the previous two days. The Waterford Trades Hall has emphasized the importance of continuing to observe the National Rest.
The Irish Volunteers, a paramilitary group of Irish nationalists, organized parades around Ireland on St. Patrick’s Day 1916. The authorities documented 38 St. Patrick’s Day parades with 6,000 marchers, over half of them were reportedly holding weapons. ), the, and the. The Irish War of Independence and Civil War followed, and this served as the catalyst for the Irish revolutionary movement. St. Patrick’s Day celebrations in Ireland were declining at this time, despite the fact that it was occasionally chosen as the day for sizable political demonstrations. After the founding of the Irish Free State, the festivities remained low-key; the only state-organized event was a military procession and trooping of the colors, along with an Irish-language heavyness attended by government ministers. Although it was still lawful in Northern Ireland, the Irish Independent State government outlawed the sale of alcohol on St. Patrick’s Day in 1927. The restriction was lifted only in 1961.
In 1931, the first St. Patrick’s Day parade in Dublin’s underbelly was held under state sponsorship. St. Patrick’s Day parades have been postponed or cancelled on a few occasions around the Republic of Ireland, always for health and safety concerns. St. Patrick’s Day events were moved to May in 2001 as a precaution against the foot-and-mouth outbreak, and the St. Patrick’s Day Parade was completely canceled in 2020 and 2021 as a result of the severity of the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead, the St. Patrick’s Day Festival 2021 organizers broadcast virtual activities to Ireland via its SPF TV web channel.
A Christian parade celebrating St. Patrick’s Day passes by Downpatrick, where Saint Patrick is reputed to be buried.
Sectarian strife in Northern Ireland had an impact on how St. Patrick’s Day was observed. Historically, a sizable minority of people identified as Catholic Irish nationalists, whereas the majority of people were Protestant Ulster unionists who identified as British. The unionist administration of Northern Ireland did not formally observe St. Patrick’s Day, despite the fact that it was widely observed. Public St. Patrick’s Day celebrations were uncommon during the Troubles, which lasted from the late 1960s until the late 1990s, and tended to be reserved for the Catholic population. Four citizens were killed and numerous more were hurt when loyalists exploded a tire bomb beneath a pub filled with Catholics celebrating St. Patrick’s Day annually beneath Dungannon in 1976. Instead, a few Protestant unionists made an effort to “re-claim” the holiday, and the Orange Order organized its own St. Patrick’s Day procession in 1985. Angry community St. Patrick’s Day parades across towns throughout Northern Ireland since the conclusion of the conflict in 1998 have drawn thousands of onlookers.
The Republic of Ireland’s government launched a push to use St. Patrick’s Day to promote Ireland and its culture in the middle of the 1990s. The government established the St. Patrick’s Festival with the following objectives:
to host a national holiday that is on par with all the world’s greatest festivals
To ignite vigor and enthusiasm across Ireland through innovative ideas, artistic expression, community involvement, and marketing efforts
To provide relatives of Irish heritage (and those who occasionally wish they were Irish) the chance and resolve to attend and participate in the creative and expressive celebrations
to accurately represent Ireland as a creative, smart, and professional nation with global appeal.
The first Saint. Patrick’s Day celebration took place on March 17, 1996. It changed from being a once-per-year tournament in 1997 to a couple-per-year event in 2000. The celebration expanded to five days in 2006, and in 2009, more than 675,000 people came to watch the procession. Over 1 million people in all attended the five-year festival in 2009, taking part in events like concerts, outdoor theater productions, and fireworks displays. The centerpiece of the St. Patrick’s celebration was the Skyfest exactly the thing, which was held from 2006 to 2012.
The 2004 St. Patrick’s Symposium’s theme was “Talking Irish,” which was perfect because it led to discussions about the nature of Irish identity, economic success, and the future. Since 1996, a greater emphasis has been placed on promoting and celebrating a flexible and all-encompassing idea of “Irishness” as opposed to an identity-based component of the typical religious or ethnic devotion. Irish language speakers typically use better Irish waves during the week around St. Patrick’s Day Seachtain na Gaeilge (“Irish Language Week”).
Irish Church authorities have voiced alarm over the secularization of St. Patrick’s Day. It is time to recover St. Patrick’s Day as a church holiday, wrote Fr. Vincent Twomey beneath the topic of debate in The Expression magazine for March 2007. He questioned the need for “mindless alcohol-fuelled partying” and concluded that “it is essential to to transmit the piety and the fun at once”.
The largest celebrations take place in Downpatrick, County Down, where Saint Patrick is reputed to still be interred. In the past, Dripsey in County Cork had the world’s shortest St. Patrick’s Day parade. Just 23.4 meters long, the parade passed by the majority of the village’s two taverns. The yearly celebration started in 1999 but ended five years later when one of the two bars closed.
other European holiday celebrations
Every year in 2016, Saint Patrick’s Day is celebrated below an Irish bar in Hamburg, Germany, England.
Celebration on Saint Patrick’s Day in 2006 at Trafalgar Square in London
After Queen Alexandra’s introduction of the custom below 1901, the British Royals regularly give bowls of shamrock to soldiers of the Irish Guards, a regiment underneath the British Army. The Duchess of Cambridge first let the Irish Guards use the bowls of shamrock back in 2012. Male royals have also taken up the job of delivering the bowls of shamrock, including King George VI in 1950 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the creation of the Irish Guards and the Duke of Cambridge in 2016 to lay of his wife. No matter where they are stationed, the Irish Guards receive complimentary fresh shamrocks that are flown in from Ireland.
While some Saint Patrick’s Day festivities could be held publicly in Britain prior to the 1960s, this may have changed after the IRA’s bombing campaign on British soil began. As a result, there was a growing mistrust of all things Irish and those who supported them, which led to people of Irish descent wearing shamrocks on Saint Patrick’s Day in private or attending certain events. People of Irish origin publicly wear a sprig of shamrock today, many years after the Good Friday Agreement, to honor their Irishness.
The Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church are two Christian movements in Great Britain that observe his feast day.
Birmingham hosts the largest Saint Patrick’s Day parade in all of Britain, with a two-mile (3-kilometer) parade through the heart of the city. After Dublin and New York, the organizers rank it as the third-largest parade worldwide.
Since 2002, there has been a Saint Patrick’s Day parade in London that normally takes place on weekends around March 17th, beneath Trafalgar Square. The water beneath the fountains in Trafalgar Square was colored green underneath the year 2008. The COVID-19 pandemic forced the cancellation of the Parade beneath 2020.
Of all the English towns, Liverpool has the largest percentage of people having Irish ancestry. This has resulted in a storied St. Patrick’s Day celebration in terms of music, cultural activities, and the parade.
A two-week Irish festival is held in Manchester each year just before Saint Patrick’s Day. The festival has a major procession, an Irish Market located at the town hall, which is where the Irish tricolor is flown opposite the Union Flag, as well as several cultural and educational activities throughout the two-week program.
Malta
Green lighting on Porte des Bombes during the 2014 Saint Patrick’s Day celebration
The Royal Dublin Fusiliers soldiers who were stationed beneath Floriana were responsible for starting the first Saint Patrick’s Day celebrations in Malta in the early 20th century. Festivities were place below the Balzunetta neighborhood of the municipality, which was close to the barracks and featured a number of taverns. The annual feast was still observed by the Irish diaspora in Malta.
Saint Patrick’s Day is now primarily observed in the St Julian’s neighborhoods below Spinola Bay and Paceville, however other celebrations continue to take place in Floriana and other places. Hundreds of Maltese people join the festivities because “beer drinking is more closely identified with Irish culture than traditional Irish culture.”
Norway
Since 2000, Norway has held a St. Patrick’s Day parade below Oslo, which was initially organized by Irish immigrants who lived there and was in part coordinated with the Irish embassy in Oslo.
Russia
An annual Saint Patrick’s Day festival is held in Moscow.
The first St. Patrick’s Day parade in Russia was organized in 1992. A yearly “Saint Patrick’s Yearly” event has been held below Moscow and other Russian towns since 1999. The official in the center of the Moscow parade, which is held in partnership with the government of Moscow and the Irish embassy beneath Moscow, is a military-style parade. Volunteers organize the unofficial procession, which resembles a carnival. In 2014, Saint Patrick’s Day was observed on March 17 as part of Moscow Irish Week, which was observed from March 12 to March 23. Around 70 events honoring Irish culture below Moscow, St Petersburg, Yekaterinburg, Voronezh, and Volgograd were being funded by the Irish Embassy, the Moscow Municipal Government, and other groups.
The feast of Saint Patrick was added to the Russian Orthodox Church’s liturgical calendar in 2017 for celebration on March 30.
Serbia and Montenegro
A sizable Irish expat population lives in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina’s main city. The Sarajevo Irish Festival was formed by the locals in 2015, and it is held for a few days between most of the year and Saint Patrick’s Day. The festival features Irish theater companies, screens Irish movies, and arranges concerts by Irish folk singers. It also organizes an annual parade. Several Irish musicians, artists, and directors of theater have performed at the festival, including Conor Horgan, Ailis Ni Riain, Dermot Dunne, Mick Moloney, and others.
Scotland
Celebration of the Saint Patrick’s Day holiday in 2009 in Coatbridge, Scotland
A Saint Patrick’s Day festival is also held at Coatbridge, a Scottish town where the majority of the population is of Irish heritage. This festival includes celebrations and parades that take place below the city center.
Due mostly to Irish immigration that occurred over the 19th century, Glasgow has a sizeable Irish community. This immigration served as the primary factor in Glasgow’s second 100,000-person population increase. Due to the significant Irish community in Glasgow, there are numerous Irish-themed bars and organizations that celebrate Saint Patrick’s Day annually. Prior to 2007, Glasgow featured a day-long Saint Patrick’s Day procession and celebration.
Switzerland
While Saint Patrick’s Day in Switzerland is often observed on March 17 with festivities akin to those in Switzerland’s neighboring central European nations, it is not uncommon for Swiss students to host events on Saint Patrick’s Eve while living alone. Most favored are typically those below Zurich’s Kreis 4. In the past, guests have also brought drinks and dressed in green.
Lithuania
Although not being a national holiday in Lithuania, the Vilnius Flood is colored green on Saint Patrick’s Day in the nation’s capital.
Americas \sCanada
One of the oldest and biggest Saint Patrick’s Day parades in North America is held in Montreal each year.
Le jour de la Saint-Patrick (French: le jour de la Saint-Patrick) is a holiday celebrated on March 17th in North America. The city of Montreal’s flag features a shamrock in the lower-right quadrant. The United Irish Societies of Montreal have organized the day commemoration since 1929. Since 1824, the parade has been held annually without fail. Irish soldiers serving in the Montreal Garrison after the British invasion of New France began to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day in particular below Montreal as early as 1759.
The annual Saint Patrick’s Day celebration lasts for a whole week in Saint John, New Brunswick. An Irish celebration honoring Saint John’s Irish roots follows the JP Collins Celtic Festival. The festival is named in honor of James Patrick Collins, a young Irish doctor who worked at the quarantine facility on Partridge Island in Saint John County and later passed away there while caring for sick Irish immigrants.
The Irish Association of Manitoba organizes a music and culture festival centered around Saint. Patrick’s Day every couple of years in Manitoba.
In order to honor the Celtic Peoples and your cultures, the CelticFest Vancouver Society organized its first annual festival in downtown Vancouver in 2004. Every year, on the weekend closest to St. Patrick’s Day, this event, which includes a parade, takes place.
From 1837 through 1926, there was a parade in Québec Town. After more than 84 years, the St. Patrick’s Day Parade in Québec City made a comeback in 2010. A portion of the pipes and drums from the New York Police Department attended the event as special guests.
Since at least 1863, a parade has taken place beneath Toronto.
From 1919 through 1927, the Toronto Maple Leafs hockey team played under the name Toronto St. Patricks and wore green uniforms. The Maple Leafs wore green St. Patrick’s Day throwback uniforms in 1999 when they played on St. Patrick’s Day.
Certain organizations, most notably Guinness, have advocated for Saint Patrick’s Day to be declared a national holiday.
Just in time for St. Patrick’s Day in 2009, the Calgary Tower replaced its top face lights with new green CFL bulbs. The green reflected environmental concerns in the middle of a Project Porchlight campaign run by an environmental non-profit organization. In time for Saint Patrick’s Day, about 210 lights that resembled a leprechaun’s hat were being altered. After a week, dejected CFLs carried out their plans. The Calgary Tower was predicted to save about $12,000 and emit 104 tonnes fewer greenhouse gases as a result of the move.
the United States
The Chicago Onslaught was green-tinted.
primary objective: Saint Patrick’s throughout the United States each year
St. Patrick’s Day Although it is not a recognized holiday in the United States, St. Patrick’s Day is celebrated annually as a celebration of Irish and Irish-American culture. There are several parades, religious ceremonies, large displays of the color green, and huge amounts of alcohol consumed during the festivities. Specifically in what is now the United States, the exploit has been commemorated since 1600, with the first parade taking place in 1601.
For the first time in more than 250 years, the largest parade in the world, which was scheduled to take place beneath New York City in 2020, has been postponed because to the COVID-19 epidemic.
Mexico
On Saint Patrick’s Day, Mexico honors the Saint Patrick’s Battalion.
Argentina
Reconquista Boulevard is the focal point of Buenos Aires’ festivities.
The Reconquista street in the center of Buenos Aires, where there are several Irish bars, is where a party is conducted underground. In 2006, there were 50,000 couples partying below this street and the nearby pubs. The Catholic Church and the Irish community, which outside of Ireland is the fifth-largest in the world, do not participate in party planning.
Montserrat
The island of Montserrat is renowned as the “Emerald Island of the Caribbean” because of its establishment by Irish exiles from Saint Kitts and Nevis. Together with Ireland and the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador, Montserrat is one of just a few locations where Saint Patrick’s Day is a public holiday. The excavation beneath Montserrat honors a failed slave uprising that took place on March 17, 1768.
Oceania \sAustralia
While being observed annually in all the states and territories of Australia, St. Patrick’s Day is not a national holiday. Weekends in the middle of 17 March are frequently used for festivals and parades beneath major cities like Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide, and Melbourne. Festivals and parades are occasionally postponed. For instance, Melbourne’s St. Patrick’s Day celebrations and parades were postponed in 2006 and 2007 because of scheduled sporting events (the Commonwealth Games and the Australian Grand Prix), which were part of the town’s planned St. Patrick’s Day celebrations and parades. The yearly procession and family gathering beneath Sydney was postponed in 2016 due to budgetary difficulties. Sadly, unlike many other St. Patrick’s Day parades around the world, Brisbane’s St. Patrick’s Day parade, which was canceled at the start of World War II and wasn’t reintroduced until 1990, was not canceled in 2020 as a precaution for the COVID-19 pandemic.
The first mention of St. Patrick’s Day being observed in Australia dates back to 1795, when Catholic and Protestant Irish administrators and convicts living in the penal colony joined forces to observe the day as a national holiday despite the fact that public gatherings were illegal under the age of 18. This unified year of Irish nationalist observance may soon fade with time, with St. Patrick’s Day celebrations becoming controversial across religions and socioeconomic classes, more indicative of Australianness than Irishness, and conducted sporadically over the years. Author Patrick O’Farrell attributes the revival of St. Patrick’s Day celebrations in Australia and the sense of Irishness among the majority of people of Irish ancestry to the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin and Archbishop Daniel Mannix of Melbourne. The Catholic clergy, who frequently courted controversy, were the primary planners of the St. Patrick’s Day celebrations in the past. Bishop Patrick Phelan of Sale wrote in 1921 about how the government of Victoria had mandated that a Union Jack remain flown at the front of the St. Patrick’s Day parade. When Irishmen and Irish-Australians refused to comply, the government paid for a single flag to be brought to the front of the parade. Two males afterwards assaulted this person, and they were later penalized by the court.
In New Zealand
St. Patrick’s Day was recognized as a public holiday in New Zealand from 1878 to 1955, together with St. George’s Day (England) and St. Andrew’s Day (Scotland). In the 1850s and 1860s, Auckland was the destination of many Irish immigrants, and it was here that some of the first St. Patrick’s Day celebrations, which frequently involved organizing community picnics, took place. Amazingly, from the late 1860s onward, this developed quickly to encompass organizing parades with pipe bands and marching kids wearing green, sporting events, concerts, balls, and other social events, places where people proudly expressed their Irishness. St. Patrick’s Day is still observed in New Zealand with festivals and parades on or around March 17 even though it is no longer recognized as a national holiday.
Asia
St. Patrick’s Day inside Motomachi, Yokohama, annually
Parades for Saint Patrick are now held in a lot of places across Japan. The Irish Network Japan (INJ) organized the first procession beneath Tokyo in 1992.
Since 1976, the Irish Association of Korea has held an annual Saint Patrick’s Day celebration in Seoul, South Korea’s capital city. Itaewon and Daehangno no longer serve as the parade and festival’s starting and ending points, respectively.
The largest Saint Patrick’s Day event in Asia is held annually in Malaysia by the St. Patrick’s Society of Selangor, which was founded in 1925. Also, 36 parties are organized by Guinness Anchor Berhad all across the nation in locations like as the Klang Valley, Penang, Johor Bahru, Malacca, Ipoh, Kuantan, Kota Kinabalu, Miri, and Kuching.
Space Station International
On St. Patrick’s Day, astronaut Chris Hadfield wore green on the International Space Station. The festival was observed in a variety of ways by astronauts aboard the International Space Station in 2013 as they did every year. On Saint Patrick’s Day 2011, Irish-American Catherine Coleman performed aboard the International Space Station while performing on a 100-year-old flute owned by Matt Molloy and a tin whistle owned by Paddy Moloney, both members of the Irish music group The Chieftains. On the band’s 2012 CD, Voice of Ages, she later appeared in a section titled “The Chieftains under Orbit” beneath a track.
On March 17th, 2013, Saint Patrick’s Day, Chris Hadfield uploaded online images of Ireland taken from space and a snapshot of himself in green attire taken within the space station. Also, he uploaded a recording of himself performing “Danny Youngster” in outer space online.
Criticism
Celebrations of Saint Patrick’s Day have drawn criticism, particularly for being linked to intoxication in public and disruptive behavior. Others claim that the celebrations have deviated from their original goal of honoring St. Patrick and Irish history by becoming overly commercialized and gaudy. Niall O’Dowd, an Irish American journalist, has criticized efforts to reframe Saint Patrick’s Day as a celebration of multiculturalism rather than Irishness.
a man wearing a leprechaun costume on St. Patrick’s Day.
The Saint Patrick’s Day festivities have also come under fire for perpetuating derogatory stereotypes about Ireland and Irish people. An example is the donning of ‘leprechaun clothes’, precisely what are based on unflattering 19th century stereotypes of the Irish. 2014’s St. Patrick’s Day was quickly approaching, but the Ancient Order of Hibernians successfully lobbied large US stores to avoid selling novelty goods that reinforced unfavorable stereotypes of Ireland.
The annual Saint Patrick’s Day celebrations outside of Ireland have been referred to as “Plastic Paddyness” exhibitions because they take Irish culture and stereotypes and misrepresent them.
Hurley v. Irish-American Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Group of Boston, a major Supreme Court decision, ended the long-standing prohibition against LGBT groups in the US from walking in Saint Patrick’s Day parades in New York City and Boston. Amazingly, despite the fact that the ban was repealed within New York Municipality in 2014, LGBT groups still encounter difficulties to participation. The prohibition on LGBT group membership in Boston was repealed in 2015.
events in sports
Both the All-Ireland Senior Club Football Championship and the All-Ireland Senior Club Hurling Championship were previously played in Croke Park in Dublin on Saint Patrick’s Day. However, starting in January 2020, several of these events will no longer be played there. The Interprovincial Championship used to take place on March 17 but was switched to games taking place in the fall instead.
On Saint Patrick’s Day each year, the Leinster Schools Rugby Senior Cup, Munster Schools Rugby Senior Cup, and Ulster Schools Senior Cup are played. During the weekend following Saint Patrick’s Day each year, the Connacht Schools Rugby Senior Cup is played.
The Cheltenham Festival, which annually falls on Saint Patrick’s Day, draws a sizable number of Irish people, both British citizens and numerous visitors from Ireland.
England, France, Ireland, Italy, Scotland, and Wales compete in the Six Nations Championship, an annual international rugby union tournament, which culminates around Saint Patrick’s Day. At Twickenham, London, on St. Patrick’s Day 2018, Ireland overcame England 24–15 to win their third Grand Slam overall.
An international rugby league competition called the Saint Patrick’s Year Workout is held halfway between the US and Ireland. First beginning in 1995, the competition went on to continue in 1996, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2011, and 2012. The US won the remaining five tests, while Ireland won the first two and the test played in 2011. The game is typically played on March 17 or the days around it to celebrate Saint Patrick’s Day.
The various North American and American professional sports leagues that compete in late March frequently wear unique third jerseys to recognize the festival. Examples include the Toronto Maple Leafs (who wear Toronto St. Patrick’s Day throwbacks), New York Knicks, Toronto Raptors, Buffalo Sabres (who have worn special Irish-themed period jerseys), and most Major League Baseball teams. In recent years, the New Jersey Devils have participated on Saint Patrick’s Day by wearing their green and red throwback jerseys.