Do you consider St. Patrick's Day a holiday?

Littlejen22

A friend of mine was complaining about the skull and crossbones shirts for st party's day at TCP and eventually said it was disrespectful bc it is a Saints holiday, I almost died laughing and told her that she was not going to win me over on that argument horehound is a drinking holiday for most people, one involves people getting drunk to celebrate. Then she tries to argue that skull and crossbones "means something g" and started looking it up online. I know she hates the skull and cross one look (which I now realize is why her 7 and 6yo are scared of them, she tells them stupid crap that scares them) but I thought this was grasping at straws. On and FWIW, I loved the Crazy 8 skull/rock star line. Oh, and she rarely goes to church  

And le me state before i get flamed and told to get a life, i realize this is unimportant, but this place is dreadfully slow   So, your thoughts? 

veloelle

She has a point; how would you feel about Jesus's (Christmas, Easter) image emblazoned with sculls and crossbones for children's clothes? Not exactly tasteful, it's just a pathetic marketing attempt to get kids and parents to buy more cheap crap by exploiting a holiday. The scull stuff on regular clothes, meh, I don't care one way or another.

St. Patrick is a saint, it didn't start out all about beer. Same thing, for example, as Cinco de Mayo, which is  celebration of the mexican army's defeat of the french. And now it's all about drinking and parties. 

https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11554a.htm

 

EastCoastBride

No, I don't consider it a holiday. 

jlw2505

Nope - the only time I have ever done anything for St Paddy's Day was drink green milk/eat green food that school had while growing up and throughout college, we spend the day at the bar drinking. 

p1nklemonade

do i consider it a holiday? no.  it is a saint's holy day in the roman catholic church though.  fwiw, i hate the skull and crossbone stuff, and not from a religious perspective, just because i feel it doesn't belong on kids clothing.

and now for something completely different

veloelle:

She has a point; how would you feel about Jesus's (Christmas, Easter) image emblazoned with sculls and crossbones for children's clothes? Not exactly tasteful, it's just a pathetic marketing attempt to get kids and parents to buy more cheap crap by exploiting a holiday. The scull stuff on regular clothes, meh, I don't care one way or another.

St. Patrick is a saint, it didn't start out all about beer. Same thing, for example, as Cinco de Mayo, which is  celebration of the mexican army's defeat of the french. And now it's all about drinking and parties. 

https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11554a.htm

 

Oh there was christmas clothing with it on it too. I haven't seen it on easyer stuff yet, but I'm sure Target won't let me down.

DandelionMom

It is a saint's day.  Growing up it was almost a mini-Thanksgiving and a day you went to church if you could make it.  I don't usually get to church for it anymore but we do have a big family dinner and we attempt to make it Irish-ish. 

ETA: and the skull and cross bones don't bug me as much as the 4 leaf clovers -- a shamrock has 3 leaves people and that is actually important to St. Patrick. 

Littlejen22

veloelle:

She has a point; how would you feel about Jesus's (Christmas, Easter) image emblazoned with sculls and crossbones for children's clothes? Not exactly tasteful, it's just a pathetic marketing attempt to get kids and parents to buy more cheap crap by exploiting a holiday. The scull stuff on regular clothes, meh, I don't care one way or another.

St. Patrick is a saint, it didn't start out all about beer. Same thing, for example, as Cinco de Mayo, which is  celebration of the mexican army's defeat of the french. And now it's all about drinking and parties. 

https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11554a.htm

Not tastefuly, I agree.  And I totally understand that it did not start as a party day, I just don't see how someone could say that they go out drinking for St. Patrick's Day (which I she probably won't drink much this year but only b/c of her little kids) and yet that the shirt is disrespectful, I would think drinking for a Saint is disrespectful if we want to argue the religious side of it.  Oh, well, like I said it is certainly not a big deal.

AnnapolisLari

No, but I'm not Catholic.

I don't go drinking on St. Patrick's Day. I do make corned beef and cabbage for DH because he's got some Irish ancestry, although I know that the Irish don't actually eat it. LOL

I hate the skull and crossbones clothes for kids at any time.

Leila'sMommy

My whole family is Irish, and St. Patrick's Day is most definitely a holiday for us. Not like, Christmas-scale, but we have a day-long brunch, drink a little, enjoy family time. Been that way since I was a kid, and I love it. It's actually one of my favorite holidays, even more than Christmas. It's unexplainable why I love it so much, sounds corny but I have a real deep root in my heart for my family and I love seeing them together happy and having fun.

I wouldn't be offended by any type of attire on St. Patrick's Day, but you can bet my kid will be wearing green

debs1018

No, but I am Catholic. My Irish friends do celebrate it though, they even take the day off from work. The skulls are NMS, but I have a friend who loves them. :shrugs:

penguingrrl

My dad's all Irish and my mom's half Irish and St. Patrick's day is definitely a holiday to me. I'll make Irish soda bread for breakfast and I'll probably make "bangers and mash: for dinner that night (because who doesn't love sausage and mashed potatoes!) and have smithwicks beer. I used to go out drinking for the day, so I'm not hugely religious about it or anything, but I definitely use it to honor my Irish heritage.

I'm not offended by the skulls although they have no relation to the day so I think they're silly in this context.

MrsSR

A holiday no... a feast day?  Yes.

knmommy

Yes, we consider it a holiday.  We have family and friends over, it is also Allison's birthday.  (celebrated since before Allison was born) I don't care about the skull and crossbones though

Jinsy80

It's definitely a holiday! 

Ilumine

As an Episcopalian who leans more towards the English Anglican Church, than the American Church, we celebrate all of the Saints Days as "special holy days", especially the patron saints of England and the Isles - which includes St Patrick of Ireland.

I try really hard to remember the reasons behind any of these feast days, as well as enjoy the celebration part of it, even though I am not Irish. 

But if we, as a country, only celebrated holidays that had very specific meaning to me, why do we have off on President's day or (my personal non-favorite) Labor Day (not a union or socialism supporter thank you very much - my dad's family fled Poland for a reason).

As for the Skull and Crossbone thing...we lived in Fort Walton Beach FL for a couple of years and I volunteered at the Chamber of Commerce and worked the Billy Bowlegs Festival, not to mention grew up going to Disney World.  Pirates are Pirates. 

Will I let my DD wear the S&C on a regular basis, no (because I think there are so many otherr disigns out there). But an occassional outfit for fun.  What is the harm. 

Your friend is very hypocritical....if she celebrates St Patricks day without following the meaning of the holiday - celebrating the life of a christian missionary - but cannot enjoy the silliness of the S&C without getting into the deeper meaning of it. 

You cannot pick and choose which piece of history you want to whitewash.

Zenya

I grew up in ireland.

It's a 'holy day of obligation' where you have to go to mass.  then you get plastered at night.  It was getting less saintly by the year when I left (1998).

Here IME people are very 'lucky charms' about it. I don't consider it to be a holy day.   

Emiliana7

I'm Catholic, so its a 'holiday' in the fact that its St. Patrick's feast day. I try to cook something Irishy for dinner for us but that's about the extent of our celebrating it.

As for the S&C- I don't mind the. but it does seems like they are on everything lately. I think its cute as in the PP's siggy pic of her kid. Something like that is fine. My aunt and uncle used to fly a S&C flag on their boat on the lake, then everybody started to do it, so they stopped. Its a bit overkill lately.

But also, FWIW, I do change my language setting on facebook to pirate on 'talk like a pirate day'

pookie2005

We decorate for it at home because I'm Irish and we just have fun decorating with DD. We don't really "celebrate" it except to maybe make some corned beef and throw some green food coloring in our beer that day. It's just something to do. We're not religious so we don't look at it from the saint aspect, really.