Why do we celebrate st. patick's day?

Question

I know its for the irish, but why exactly do they celebrate it?

Answer 1

It is actually an Irish-American Tradition and prolly created by Irish Americans to get a day where it is ok to get smashed and say it's a holiday. lol. Seriously I love the holiday. And I think it is because the immigrants wanted a day to fell like they were back home in Ireland. Sliante
R

Answer 2

The modern secular holiday is based on the original Christian saint's feast day also thought to be the date of the saint's death. In 1737, Irish immigrants to the United States began observing the holiday publicly in Boston and held the first St. Patrick's Day Parade in New York City in 1766.

Today, the tradition continues with people from all walks and heritages by wearing green, eating Irish food, and attending parades. St. Patrick's Day is bursting with folklore; from the shamrock to the leprechaun and to pinching those that are not wearing green.

The History channel has a great video (online) seperating fact from "blarney" regarding St. Patrick's day.

Answer 3

You're clearly not Catholic, but God forgives the heathen because they know not what they do so I'd put that out of your mind. St. Patrick is the patron saint of Ireland. Over time to escape the terrible poverty and cruel ways of the English (and sometimes for adventure and sometimes for punishment), Irish people emigrated to America. Naturally they took their faith and culture with them (just like all the people before them and after) and to make theselves feel at home in this new land they kept to their traditions. Of course moving somewhere new will change a person and when they have a family their children will live a bit differently to the way they would have in Ireland, you have a bit of the old mixed up with a bit of the new.
So, it's changed a bit over the years in the US but that bound to happen. As long as you're having the craic I don't think it matters. My mother refuses to acknowledge Mother's Day now (which is this Sunday here) since I lost my son (she thinks it'll hurt my feelings, she's a good mother) and says she's celebrating St Patrick two days in a row instead. She's coming here for dinner but I've told her I'm still cooking pasta, St Patrick or not.
The wearing of the green is for Eire - the Emerald Isle, which is the proper name for Ireland. The shamrock (little 3 leafed plant) is a Catholic symbol of the Holy Trinity, 3 in 1, God the Father, God the Saviour (Jesus Christ) and God the Holy Ghost. As for the ale Guinness is a traditional Irish drink but I suppose because it's a holiday people like to celebrate. (Not all the Irish drink too much!)
It's a thing people like to do - I don't know a group of people on Earth that doesn't like to celebrate something.
Slainte (which is Gaelic for "Your good health".)

Answer 4

Outside of the ethnic and historical reasons (well listed in the above answers, btw), part of the appeal of St. Patrick's Day is the claim that "everybody's Irish on St. Paddy's Day!"

Since America is a country of immigrants, most of us have ancestral ties to some other country in the world. The teary-eyed Irishman (or his grandson) singing about his native land touches all our hearts. We remember the beauty, people and love of our past, no matter the reasons we left the home country.

In that sense, we are all "Irish" on March 17, no matter where our families came from. Wearin' the green and lifting a glass of Guinness to honor our common immigrant heritage is a grand and glorious tradition!

Answer 5

History
Saint Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland, was born, probably in Roman Britain, about AD 385, and was originally called Maewyn.

At the age of 16, he was sold into slavery by a group of Irish marauders that raided his village. Having been a pagan before, he became closer to Christianity during his captivity.

He escaped from slavery after six years and went to Gaul where he studied in the monastery under St. Germain, bishop of Auxerre for a period of twelve years. During his training he became aware that his calling was to convert the pagans to Christianity.

He wished to return to Ireland and to convert the native pagans to Christianity, but his superiors instead appointed St. Palladius. However, two years later Palladius transferred to Scotland. Patrick, having adopted that Christian name earlier, was then appointed as second bishop to Ireland.

Patrick was quite successful at winning converts which upset the Celtic Druids. Patrick was arrested several times, but escaped each time. He traveled throughout Ireland, establishing monasteries across the country. He also set up schools and churches which would aid him in his conversion of the Irish country to Christianity.

His mission in Ireland lasted for thirty years. After that time, Patrick retired to County Down. He died on March 17 in AD 461. That day has been commemorated as St. Patrick's Day ever since.

Much Irish folklore surrounds St. Patrick's Day. Some of this lore includes the belief that Patrick raised people from the dead[2].He also is said to have given a sermon from a hilltop that drove all the snakes from Ireland. No snakes were ever native to Ireland[3], some scholars think this is a metaphor for the conversion of the pagans. Though originally a Catholic holy day, St. Patrick's Day has evolved into more of a secular holiday.

One traditional icon of the day is the shamrock. This stems from a more bona fide Irish tale that tells how Patrick used the three-leafed shamrock to explain the Trinity. He used it in his sermons to represent how the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit could all exist as separate elements of the same entity. His followers adopted the custom of wearing a shamrock on his feast day.

The St. Patrick's Day custom came to America in 1737, the first year St. Patrick's Day was publicly celebrated, in Boston, Massachusetts.

Today, people celebrate the day with parades, wearing green, and drinking beer

Answer 6

I don't know much about St Patrick or St Patrick Day but I do know that St. Patrick was not sold into slavery, he was kidnapped and was held captive in Mount Slemish. Until He escaped six years later. In his diary he said he escaped because a voice he believed to be Jesus told him to. Where He then went to Britain and there he writes that he saw a vision of an angel and it told him to go back to Ireland as a missionary.
After fifteen years of schooling St. Patrick was named a priest and was sent off to Ireland to minister to Christians already in Ireland and to start converting Ireland. And through all his teachings he died on March 17th and that date falls in the middle of Irish Lent. So on that day it is prohibited to eat meat.
But the first St. Patricks Day parade was not held in Ireland. It was actually held in America in New York were the Irish soldiers serving in the English military marched through New York City on March 17th 1762. After the potato famine in Ireland of 1845 most poor uneducated Irish families poured into America to escape starvation. On St Patrick's Day they all lined in the streets to celebrate which soon went across all of America and just stuck as one of Americas Holidays because of all the Irish-Americans that now lived in the United States.

Answer 7

we celebrate St. Patrick's day because there was a saint that was named St. Patrick and he died so ireland and the whole world is celebrating that by wearing green.

Answer 8

In honor of St. Patrick, who drove all the snakes from Ireland away.

Answer 9

It is hard to travel to any English speaking country and not find someone with Irish blood.

Answer 10

unless you are in Ireland I have no idea...Ireland celebrates because this guy named Patrick became a saint by chasing all the snakes out of Ireland