::A very similar post to this was written and never published on February 17. I have repurposed the post, almost unchanged, for St. Patrick's Day.::
St. Valentine's Day is obviously over. As such, this post is over one month late...or just under eleven months early. My friend Brett posted the drawing to the right on Facebook on February 15, which is some of the inspiration behind this post.
Unfortunately, Brett is not big on self-promotion and the like, particularly with regards to his drawings. As such, he does not have a website to which I can send you to check out his other stuff, which is pretty great. When we were in high school his notebooks would become comic books, and he still posts to Facebook some wonderful (but much shorter) comics. This is of course a self-portrait, one of my favorite series that he has undertaken(1). That being said, let's get down to the matter at hand.
As you probably know, I'm Protestant, not Catholic. We do not venerate anyone as all who are in Christ are saints. Even so, I find the tales of the classic saints interesting, especially those with holidays bearing their name, as they are cultural institutions about whom I know nothing. How did they get holidays? How can I get a holiday(2)? And what do cards, hearts, and candy have to do with Valentine?
Honestly, no one really seems to know a lot about him. Nearly all of the history surrounding Valentine comes to us from later hagiographies. Fortunately, there are a few constants.
Valentine is by all accounts promoting Christian marriage in some way, generally by performing them. Christianity was illegal, and consequently helping Christians in any way was illegal. Some say that he restored the sight of the blind daughter of Judge Asterius while imprisoned, resulting in Asterius being baptized and Valentine being released, only to be re-arrested by Emperor Claudius for performing the sacrament and later beheaded.
Outside of this we have little but rumors, conjecture, and variance. Such is unfortunately the case with many of the saints. While I love a great story, true or false, the inconsistency irks me. In that his story is rather filled-in and consistent, St. Nicholas is a bit of an anomaly.
Another drawing by Brett? Don't mind if I do!
I wanted to do a series on the saints through and possibly even beyond St. Patrick's Day (aka tomorrow, or maybe today depending on what time it is right now). I really did. Was Patrick really a total lush? No, Alfred Guinness had not even invented his elixir yet, and Patrick was not a heavy consumer of uisce beatha(3). But what else do we know? What do we know about anyone historically?
History is an interesting study. The "good guys" always win because the story is told from their perspective. We make up the rest. We as a society come to pathologically believe it. I'm sure each of the saints had a lot of good qualities, but they were not perfect. They were merely humans. Most of what they did has been forgotten, and, as the saying goes, the rest is history.
(1)Series is not the correct word. Really, it is just a collection of drawings that happen to follow a theme. Either way, I very much enjoy seeing Brett's drawings of himself in various circumstances and guises.
(2)Just kidding - I hate holidays.
(3)This Gaelic phrase, from which we derive our word whiskey, literally means "water of life," which is also what distilled spirits were called in Latin (aqua vitae).
::A very similar post to this was written and never published on February 17. I have repurposed the post, almost unchanged, for St. Patrick's Day.::
St. Valentine's Day is obviously over. As such, this post is over one month late...or just under eleven months early. My friend Brett posted the drawing to the right on Facebook on February 15, which is some of the inspiration behind this post.
Unfortunately, Brett is not big on self-promotion and the like, particularly with regards to his drawings. As such, he does not have a website to which I can send you to check out his other stuff, which is pretty great. When we were in high school his notebooks would become comic books, and he still posts to Facebook some wonderful (but much shorter) comics. This is of course a self-portrait, one of my favorite series that he has undertaken(1). That being said, let's get down to the matter at hand.
As you probably know, I'm Protestant, not Catholic. We do not venerate anyone as all who are in Christ are saints. Even so, I find the tales of the classic saints interesting, especially those with holidays bearing their name, as they are cultural institutions about whom I know nothing. How did they get holidays? How can I get a holiday(2)? And what do cards, hearts, and candy have to do with Valentine?
Honestly, no one really seems to know a lot about him. Nearly all of the history surrounding Valentine comes to us from later hagiographies. Fortunately, there are a few constants.
Valentine is by all accounts promoting Christian marriage in some way, generally by performing them. Christianity was illegal, and consequently helping Christians in any way was illegal. Some say that he restored the sight of the blind daughter of Judge Asterius while imprisoned, resulting in Asterius being baptized and Valentine being released, only to be re-arrested by Emperor Claudius for performing the sacrament and later beheaded.
Outside of this we have little but rumors, conjecture, and variance. Such is unfortunately the case with many of the saints. While I love a great story, true or false, the inconsistency irks me. In that his story is rather filled-in and consistent, St. Nicholas is a bit of an anomaly.
Another drawing by Brett? Don't mind if I do!
I wanted to do a series on the saints through and possibly even beyond St. Patrick's Day (aka tomorrow, or maybe today depending on what time it is right now). I really did. Was Patrick really a total lush? No, Alfred Guinness had not even invented his elixir yet, and Patrick was not a heavy consumer of uisce beatha(3). But what else do we know? What do we know about anyone historically?
History is an interesting study. The "good guys" always win because the story is told from their perspective. We make up the rest. We as a society come to pathologically believe it. I'm sure each of the saints had a lot of good qualities, but they were not perfect. They were merely humans. Most of what they did has been forgotten, and, as the saying goes, the rest is history.
(1)Series is not the correct word. Really, it is just a collection of drawings that happen to follow a theme. Either way, I very much enjoy seeing Brett's drawings of himself in various circumstances and guises.
(2)Just kidding - I hate holidays.
(3)This Gaelic phrase, from which we derive our word whiskey, literally means "water of life," which is also what distilled spirits were called in Latin (aqua vitae).
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