If celebrated otherwise, Common of Martyrs
The memory of many of the missionaries who brought the Christian faith to Scotland during the Dark Ages is preserved mainly in the dedications of churches in their honour. The name of Kessog (or Mackessock) is thus preserved as a missionary bishop who laboured in the lands of Lennox among the Picts towards the end of the seventh century. He lived in a cell on Monk’s Island, Loch Lomond. According to tradition, he was born of Irish royal descent in Cashel, capital of Munster, and is said to have been martyred near Luss on Loch Lomondside around the year 700.
16 March
Boniface of Ross
Bishop
Scotland: Commemoration
If celebrated otherwise, Common of Bishops
The name of Cuiritan, or Boniface, is linked with two important Christian sites in Scotland: Restenneth in Angus, where he baptized the Pictish king Nechtan in 710, and founded a monastery; and Rosemarkie on the Black Isle, where in 716 he refounded a monastery at a place originally associated with St Moluag. He is said to have come from Italy, even perhaps from Rome. He was certainly of the Roman, rather than the Celtic, tradition – all his foundations are dedicated to St Peter – so Nechtan’s Christianity sought its inspiration from the south rather than from the Celtic west. He was famous for founding churches. The date of his death is not known.
17 March
Patrick
White
Bishop, Missionary, Patron of Ireland
England: Lesser Festival – Ireland: Festival – Scotland: IV – Wales: V
Patrick was a Romano-Briton born in about the year 390 of Christian parents in the latter years of the Roman Empire in Britain. The exact place of his birth – named by him in his Confession as Banaven Taberniae – has never been identified. Claims from places in West Britain as far apart as Dumbarton and Cornwall have been made; present day opinion favours the neighbourhood of Carlisle.
He was captured by Irish raiders when he was sixteen years old and taken to Ireland as a slave. After six years, he escaped and seems to have gone to continental Europe. He eventually found his way back to his own family, where his previously-nominal Christian faith grew and matured. He returned to Gaul and was there trained as a priest and much influenced by the form of monasticism evolving under Martin of Tours. When he was in his early forties, he returned to Ireland as a bishop, ministering first at Saul near Downpatrick, and later making his base at Armagh, which became the centre of his See. He evangelized the people of the land by walking all over the island, gently bringing men and women to a knowledge of Christ. Although he faced fierce opposition and possible persecution, he continued his missionary journeys.
Patrick left two pieces of writing which are accepted as genuine, his Confession and a Letter to Coroticus. These are of immense value as they reveal Patrick the man, humble and aware that all he achieved was by the grace of Christ. Irish Christians today, of all traditions, equally identify with this holy man and draw inspiration from his life and writings.
Despite being unsuccessful in his attempts to establish the diocesan system he had experienced in Gaul, his monastic foundations proved to be the infrastructure required to maintain the faith after his death, which occurred on this day in the year 461.
Collect
Almighty God,
who in your providence chose your servant Patrick
to be the apostle of the Irish people:
keep alive in us the fire of the faith he kindled
and strengthen us in our pilgrimage
towards the light of everlasting life;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Or (Ireland)
Almighty God,
in your providence you chose your servant Patrick
to be the apostle of the Irish people,
to bring those who were wandering in darkness and error
to the true light and knowledge of your Word:
grant that walking in that light
we may come at last to the light of everlasting life;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Or (Wales)
Almighty God,
in your providence you chose your servant Patrick
to be the apostle of the Irish people,
to baptize those who were wandering in darkness and error
and to bring them to the true light and knowledge of your Word:
keep us in that light
and bring us to everlasting life;
through Jesus Christ our Lord,
to whom with you and the Holy Spirit
be all honour and glory,
now and for ever.
A reading from the book Deuteronomy.
Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak;
let the earth hear the words of my mouth.
May my teaching drop like the rain,
my speech condense like the dew;
like gentle rain on grass,
like showers on new growth.
For I will proclaim the name of the Lord;
ascribe greatness to our God!
The Rock, his work is perfect,
and all his ways are just.
A faithful God, without deceit,
just and upright is he;
yet his degenerate children have dealt falsely with him,
a perverse and crooked generation.
Do you thus repay the Lord,
O foolish and senseless people?
Is not he your father, who created you,
who made you and established you?
Remember the days of old,
consider the years long past;
ask your father, and he will inform you;
your elders, and they will tell you.
When the Most High apportioned the nations,
when he divided humankind,
he fixed the boundaries of the peoples
according to the number of the gods;
the Lord’s own portion was his people,
Jacob his allotted share.
This is the word of the Lord.
Deuteronomy 32.1–9
Or:
A reading from the book Tobit.
Blessed be God who lives for ever,
because his kingdom lasts throughout all ages.
For he afflicts, and he shows mercy;
he leads down to Hades in the lowest regions