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| Saint Brigid as depicted in Saint Non's chapel, St Davids, Wales |
Who was St Brigid?
St Brigid was born in Faughart,
north of Dundalk, Co Louth in Ireland, approximately 450 AD and was the founder
of the first monastery in County Kildare. Her father was a pagan chieftain of
Leinster named Dubthach and her mother was a Christian slave named Brocca. She
is one of the Patron Saints of Ireland, together with St Patrick and St
Colmcille. Probably the earliest biography, The Life of St Brigid,
was written by Cogitosus, a monk of Kildare in the eighth century.
Dubthach’s wife insisted that he
get rid of the slave girl. He sold Brigid’s mother to a poet but not the child
in her womb for whom he was responsible. Later, the poet sold Brigid’s mother
to a druid. As Brigid was filled with the Holy Spirit, she could not digest the
druid’s ‘unclean’ food and
‘thereupon he chose a white cow and set it aside for the girl, and a
certain Christian woman, a very God-fearing virgin, used to milk the cow and
the girl used to drink the cow’s milk and not vomit it up as her stomach had
been healed. Moreover, this Christian woman fostered the girl’.
When she was young, St Brigid
wanted to join a convent. However, her father insisted that she marry a rich
man to whom he had promised her hand. According to legend, Brigid prayed that
her beauty be taken so no one would want to marry her and her prayer was
granted. It was not until after she made her final vows that her beauty was
restored.
Brigid enlisted God’s help again
to convince her father to give her land on which to build a convent. Her father
agreed to give her as much land as her cloak could cover. It is said that the
cloak grew to cover 2,000 acres of land! One of five ancient roads in Ireland
that lead to Tara passed through Kildare.
According to tradition, around
480 AD Brigid founded a monastery at Kildare (Cill Dara: “church of the oak”),
on the site of a pagan shrine to the Celtic goddess Brigit. Her monastery
developed a reputation for hospitality, compassion and generosity. It was known
as the ‘City of the Poor’. St Brigid worked with the sick, poor and outcast.
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| Saint Brigid's Cross |
St Brigid’s Rush Cross
On one occasion, St Brigid was
sitting by the sick bed of a dying pagan chieftain comforting him with stories
of her faith in God. She told him the story of Christ on the cross while at the
same time picking up rushes from the ground to make a cross. Before he died,
the chieftain asked to be baptised. People made similar crosses to hang over the
door of their homes to scare off evil, fire and hunger. Word spread of St
Brigid’s kindness and faith and the making of the cross from rushes that we
know today became associated with her name.
It was said that St Brigid could
miraculously milk her cows three times a day to provide a meal for visitors.
According to the Celtic tradition, the guest was seen as Christ and hospitality
was extended in that spirit.
Brigid invited a hermit called
Conleth to help her in Kildare as a spiritual pastor. She later founded a
school of art that included metalwork and illumination. It was at this school
that the Book of Kildare, which Gerald of Wales praised as "the work of
angelic, and not human skill," was beautifully illuminated. Sadly, this
book was lost three centuries ago.
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| St Brigid's Cathedral |
Brigid’s enduring
legacy
St Brigid still lives on 1,500
years later in the minds and hearts of the people of Ireland. Brigid was
extremely devout and a very strong leader. Her monastery grew and grew and
people from all over Ireland came here, many of whom joined the monastery. St
Patrick and St Brigid paved the way for Christianity in Ireland and later to
Europe.
Hundreds of holy wells are
dedicated to St Brigid in Ireland. More places names in Ireland are named after
St Brigid than St Patrick himself. Place names such as Kilbride and The Hebrides
are associated with Brigid.
St Brigid is associated with
fertility on the land. Straw doll-like effigies of St Brigid known as Breedeag
were used to bless homes.
St Brigid’s relevance
today.
St Brigid appreciated the
importance of the land, nature and the seasons. At a time when our planet is
threatened by global warming and climate change, Brigid reminds us of the need
to confront these challenges now. Today, we can learn from her example of
compassion, kindness, generosity and hospitality, as the World deals with the
consequences of poverty, war and population displacement.
On February 1st, 525,
St Brigid died of natural causes. Her body was initially kept to the right of
the high altar of Kildare Cathedral. In 1185, John de Courcy had her remains
relocated in Down Cathedral. Today, Saint Brigid's skull can be found in the
Church of St. John the Baptist in Lumiar, Portugal. The tomb in which it is
kept bears the inscription,
"Here in these three tombs lie the three Irish knights who brought
the head of St. Brigid, Virgin, a native of Ireland, whose relic is preserved
in this chapel. In memory of which, the officials of the Altar of the same
Saint caused this to be done in January AD 1283."
In 1905 Sister Mary Agnes of the
Dundalk Convent of Mercy took a purported fragment of the skull to St Bridget's
Church in Kilcurry. In 1928, Fathers Timothy Traynor and James McCarroll
requested another fragment for St Brigid's Church in Killester, a request
granted by the Bishop of Lisbon, António Mendes Belo.
Her feast day is 1 February,
which was originally a pagan festival called Imbolc, marking the beginning of
spring.
For further information please
see:
Sacred Heart Messenger, February 2019 – article
by John Scally
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