Celtic Voices, the title I chose for my old blog, refers to the voices St. Patrick heard long ago. Many people credit Patrick for bringing Christianity to Ireland. In principle this is true, but technically there were Christians in Ireland before he came, first as a slave at the age of 16, and later as a willing minister. The reason Patrick returned to a land where years earlier he had escaped captivity had to do with a dream.
In the dream a man, perhaps an angel, came to him. Quoting from my book, The Roots Irish Wisdom:
“One night a man named Victoricus visited him in a dream, bearing many letters from Ireland. He gave one to Patrick that read ‘The Voice of the Irish.’ Immediately Patrick heard the voices of those he’d known in Ireland crying out together, ‘We beg you, holy youth, that you shall come and shall walk again among us.'”
The result of Patrick listening to those voices and acting on what he heard was that Ireland was blessed with a valuable patron saint who ministered to the lost, many of whom went on to develop learning centers (monasteries) and teach others, both in Ireland and on the European continent.
I think these kind of Celtic voices (not necessarily in dreams but in legends and stories) speak to us today.
Did you know St. Patrick wasn’t Irish? He was a Roman Britain born somewhere in Wales, Scotland, or Northern England.
