Whispers from the Myth Teller

Although Montreal celebrates St. Patrick's Day on a Sunday with its annual parade, March 17th is the actual St. Patrick's Day, which in 2010 falls on a Wednesday. Historically, St. Patrick is one of Christianity’s best-known and most-loved saints who is credited with banishing all snakes from Ireland.

Of course, there never have been any snakes in Ireland for St. Patrick to banish, so we understand that the snakes actually represent the pagans and their beliefs that were replaced by Christian doctrine. Critics often point out that this day is mainly an excuse for the population to drink excessively and wear garishly green clothing.

At face value, the spirit of St. Patrick's Day has certainly been hijacked by boorish behaviour, but it's certainly not the only holiday in which that happens. Let's take a look at the other seasonal celebrations we have and consider their excesses:

• For Summer, we have St. Jean Baptist Day and Canada Day.
• For Fall, we have Thanksgiving and Halloween.
• For Winter, we have Christmas/Yule and New Year's Day.
• For Spring, we have St. Patrick's Day and Easter.

As far as I can tell, Easter is the only holiday where the worst thing that can happen is cracking a tooth on too much chocolate (Halloween can be accused of that too, but there is more boozing in scary masks than at Easter). So why does St. Patrick's Day get all the criticism?

What are we really celebrating in March? If you take a look outside, you'll undoubtedly notice that the snow has mostly melted away and the days are sunnier. The Vernal Equinox is nigh, signaling the coming of Spring and Summer, a time of growth, rebirth, and warmth. After three months of darkness and cold, St Patrick’s Day is our moment to cast off the dark shroud of winter and welcome the warmth of the sun and the rebirth of nature.

From a pagan perspective, many modern-day pagans refuse to celebrate or even acknowledge this day. The image of our pagan forefathers fleeing the threat of Christianity is not a pleasant thought. But just as our modern-day pagan pioneers attempted to reclaiming the word "witch", I should think pagans can attempt to reclaim the spirit of the Vernal Equinox celebration known as St. Patrick's Day.

If we're going to reclaim the mythology of this day, then we can tongue-in-cheek add our own take on the myth. If St. Patrick's Day celebrates the day when the patron saint of Ireland seemingly drove all the snakes from Ireland, then we can celebrate "All Snakes Day": the day the Druids tricked St. Patrick into thinking the snakes had been banished.

After all, we snakes are still here and we are thriving! We're lean, green, Pagan machines who welcome the Sun God and the Green Goddess with open arms, excited with what the warmer seasons have to offer in terms of their bounty and boundless possibilities. Just like the snake who sheds his outer skin, so do we shed our warm, protective clothing and feel the warmth on our faces and skin. We may even hoist a horn of mead or ale to share with our kith and kin, bringing family and friends together to make plans and celebrate the friendship that got us through the darker winter days.

So Happy All Snakes Day to you, fellow pagans! Go out and revel in the heat that warms your snake skin. And I will raise a toast to you and yours while we enjoy the longer days together. As for St. Patrick? It's only fitting that we extend him some Irish hospitality for his special day if he'll lower his ash staff and share a pint or two with us.

Another successful St. Patrick's Day celebration has come and gone. The Brunch was well-attended (including sarahcarotte, yukonflower, talyesin, grrscary, un_roseau, and twilightbunny,) and the food was fantastic (thanks to Edith for the Scotch Eggs)! Not much of the food was terribly Irish, but we live in a multi-cultural city, so we had plenty of cultures at the table: bagels, scones, haggis, eggs, potatoes, fruit salad (although it was more like fruit soup), bacon, etc...

The party broke up around 11:30 am as we made our way to the Parade that started at noon. Ms. Carotte still can't walk, so we rented a wheelchair for the day. The unexpected affect was that many of the Parade walkers made a point of coming to Ms. Carotte and giving her special attention. It was great.

After standing and watching for a while, near the end of the parade, we decided to take advantage of a hole in the parade route and start walking in it ourselves (right behind the James Lyng High School float. We waved, danced, shook hands with folks, got the crowd to cheer a few times, and enjoyed the walk.

Once we hit University road, we stepped out of the Parade and made our way down to the Old Dublin pub. Surprisingly, the staff was very accomodating of the wheelchair and found us a spot to sit.

We spent most of the day at the Dublin before heading over to Ben's for some smoked meat. We then headed down to Hurley's to end off the night.

sarahcarotte and yukonflower headed home around 11pm, but Kensington stayed with me until about midnight. I stayed out until about 4am, coming home in a drunken stupor. I suffered a bit the next day, but this is the price I must pay for a little over-exuberance on my part.

All in all, it was a great weekend. Thanks to everyone who made it memorable. Special thanks to yukonflower for visiting and we hope we've planted a seed to get you to move to Montreal eventually.