I Think ST. PATRICK Might Have Been a BAPTIST

 I have come to a conclusion that St. Patrick may have been a Baptist. Although, I cannot absolutely beyond a shadow of a doubt prove that this Preacher Patrick was a Baptist. However I do think there is a preponderance of evidence that he may be one of the early ones.

After some cursory and cautious and somewhat critical study of reputable writings, I am thoroughly convinced that he was not affiliated in any way with the Roman hierarchy.

It is indeed magnanimous of our Catholic friends to give this humble missionary of ours such prominence on their scroll of illustrious saints. Think of it: they have even erected cathedrals in his honor. However, I feel it is time to sweep the cobwebs of superstition and the dust of legend off this dear old preacher of the Gospel.

To most of us, Patrick is a mythical being, vaguely associated with a serpent exodus from the Emerald Isle. Other misconceptions are that he was Irish, that he was an emissary of the Pope and that his name was Patrick. All these are false. He was not Irish, he was in his honored grave 175 years before his name was even mentioned in Catholic writings and his real name was Sucat, which means "war-like" in Modern Welsh. For the sake of simplicity, throughout this treatise I will refer to him as Patrick.

Let us consider first of all:

I. Patrick's History

The libraries of the world contain innumerable biographies of Patrick which I and having a dickens of a time accepting as valid. An examination of the facts will reveal that the honored historians of the Roman hierarchy have not always been characterized by honesty, and during the Middle Ages such a web of superstition was spun around this evangelistic zealot that his real self has been distorted in the minds of millions. Most of these traditions and myths may be found in the seven ancient lives of Patrick, assembled and published in 1647 under the title Trias Thaumaturga, “The Three Wonderworking Patrons of Ireland”.

There are two documents by Patrick which are recognized by all parties as being genuine: his "Confession" or "Epistle to the Irish" and his letter  to the Christians under the cruel king, Coroticus. Then too, I should mention the Lorica or Hymn of Patrick, originally written in Latin and known as The Breastplate. These authentic writings in an irrefutable way support our convictions concerning the Apostle to the Irish.

Patrick, in his own "Confession" tells us that he was a Briton, and not an Irishman. He first saw the light of day in the town of Dumbarton on the River Clyde in the south of Scotland about the year 389 A.D. His father was a Christian deacon and his grandfather a clergyman in the ancient church of Britain, which had never come under the yoke of Rome. These facts in themselves practically crush the claims of the papacy.

At sixteen years of age, our hero was captured by a band of Scottish slave-dealing pirates who sold him to the Druid chieftain, Milcho, who reigned in the north of Ireland. For six years Patrick herded the cattle of this ruthless pagan chieftain. In his "Confession" he tells us: "When I was a youth, I was taken captive before I knew what I should desire or seek, or what I ought to shun."

It was during this time of servitude in the bleak forests of Northern Ireland that Patrick turned from his frivolous ways and came into knowledge of Christ as his own personal Savior. Of that period he says, "Frequently in the night I prayed and the love of God and His fear increased more and more in me." Possibly it was while a hidden onlooker of the weird Druid ceremonies that he was inspired of God to become a missionary to these heathen people.

He relates how, after six years, he managed to escape from his master and, after a tortuous journey over sea and land, returned to his people in Britain. It must have been a beautiful homecoming as his mother embraced him once again and his father, in amazement, learned of the lad's experiences. They had long before given him up as dead.

Like the great apostle Paul, he received a clear and personal "Macedonian call" from the Lord of harvest to preach the Gospel in the land of his former captivity. Patrick described his call in these words: "Again, I was in Britain with my parents, who received me as their son, and besought me to promise that, after the many afflictions I had endured, I would never leave them again. And then, truly, in the bosom of the night I saw a man as if coming from Ireland, whose name was Victoricus, with numerous letters, one of which he gave me, and I read the beginning of the epistle, containing the Voice of the Irish.

"And while I was reading the beginning of the epistle I thought in my mind that I heard the voice of those who were near the wood Focluti, which is near the western sea. And they shouted thus: 'We beseech thee, holy youth, to come and live amongst us.' And I was greatly pained in my heart, and could not read very much more; and thus I was proved. Thank God, that after many years the Lord performed to them according to their entreaty."

From these words it is evident that his call to go as a missionary to Ireland was not from any Pope or representative of the Roman Church. If our hero has been an agent of Rome, surely Popes Sixtus or Leo, who were his contemporaries, would have informed the Roman constituency of the astounding work being performed by Patrick and his co-laborers.

Dr. J. Lewis Smith, in his scholarly treatise, "Patrick of Ireland Not A Romanist," says, "We have in hand now 140 letters of Pope Leo the Great and we have not found a line written by him or any other Pope or any other man rejoicing over the wonderful additions to the Roman Church by Patrick and his disciples." 

Patrick, like Paul, "had the mighty ordination of the nail-pierced hands." The Book of Darrow, one of the oldest of Irish manuscripts, says nothing about his being an ecclesiastic of Rome and in his letter to the Christians under Coroticus and in his "Confession" Patrick makes no mention whatsoever of his being consecrated as a diocesan bishop.

Dr. Hamilton, in his book, "The Irish Church," says this of Patrick's confession letter: "There is not a faint Roman tinge about it. It is . . . thoroughly evangelical." And Dr. Todd says: "The confession of St. Patrick contains not a word of a mission from the Pope Celestine." 

We are certain that Patrick was a product of the Celtic Church, noted for its purity of Biblical doctrine, and not an "obsequious tool of the Romish system." Yes, we are positive that Patrick's call to go to "Ireland as a missionary was from God Himself and not from Pope Celestine.

This leads us to examine in the next post:

II. Patrick's Mission