English Talk! Let me introduce myself Опции

[sharethelight]

Hi! I'm really happy to see all of you! I know that's rather strange, I mean, speaking English in this place and at that time.
However, this is can be a real fun. This is first. Secondly, it can be a good opportunity to practise English. Why not?
I also believe we need a specail section in this forum for maintainting correspondence in English as well. I'm sure that it will be of great interest to foreigners, too. Anyway, I'd like to try and then we'll see...
Let's get to know each other better. We can write about different things: personal interests, plans, ideas, impressions, religion, Orthodoxy etc.

[luna0706]

Historical background


Saint Patrick
It is generally believed that St Patrick brought the Christian Faith to Ireland, his traditional title being Apostle of the Irish. Without wishing to diminish St Patrick's importance in any way, it is relevant to point out that in 431 St Palladius was sent to Ireland by St Celestine I Pope of Rome, as the first bishop of the Emerald Isle, with the task of administering the sacraments ‘to the Irish who professed Christ'. There must therefore have been numbers of Christians in Ireland by the time St Patrick arrived in the following year. Furthermore, the Apostle of the Irish admitted in a letter that the law of God was well planted in Ireland ‘in days of old', and that he did not wish to take credit for the work of his predecessors. It seems likely that St Patrick was also sent to Ireland to combat the Pelagian heresy, the Irish Church being suspected of Pelagian tendencies at the time. Having said as much, it is nevertheless a fact that Ireland at that time was still overwhelmingly pagan, with most of the population practising a nature-based religion that was administered by elders called druids. A hundred years after St Patrick, the Christian Faith was still only established in parts of the island.

St Patrick is traditionally credited with organizing the Irish Church, although his activities were concentrated mainly in the northern province of Ulster. It is likely that St Patrick received his spiritual instruction in the south of France, at the monastery of Lйrins. This great institution was founded by St Honoratus in 375, upon his return from Greece where he had become familiar with Orthodox Christian monasticism. Like many future, Irish monasteries, Lйrins was situated on a small island. For the next three centuries Lйrins would be a beacon of Orthodox spirituality in the midst of a worldly Latin environment. One of the great figures attached to Lйrins was St John Cassian, who strove to preserve the Orthodox faith against deviations from sound doctrine by certain extreme followers of Blessed Augustine.

When St Palladius, St Patrick and their fellow evangelists came to Ireland there were more than a hundred kingdoms of varying size to be found on the island. The people of each kingdom were known as the tuath, while the king bore the title of ri. Society was highly organised and stratified, reminiscent of the Vedic caste system. At the top were the druids, bards, lawmen and doctors, while the slaves at the base of the system had no rights. As remarked by historian David Ross, the concept of territorial dioceses could not function in such a social system. Each tuath had to be converted separately and each had to have its own Church structure, with priests and bishops effectively replacing the druids. Eventually five provincial kingdoms arose in the place of this hotchpotch of petty rulers: Munster in the south of the island, Leinster and Meath in the east, Connaught in the west, and Ulster in the north. On the odd occasion, such as the reign of Brian Boru (1002-1014), one of the provincial kings would claim the high kingship over all Ireland, based at the ancient site of Tara in County Meath. This high kingship was never uncontested or of any lasting significance. Although politically divided, before the Anglo-Norman invasion the Irish people were more or less united by three important factors: the Brehon law code, the Gaelic language and the Christian Faith.


Saint Kevin's Chapel in Glendalaugh, Ireland
From the time of his arrival in Ireland St Patrick set about converting the population to Christianity, founding churches and sowing the seeds of monasticism. His teaching was strongly Trinitarian and nature-based and upon this theology the Irish Church would be built. In contrast to many of later Non-Orthodox missionaries, he displayed a notable respect for the native spirituality and traditions that he encountered on the Emerald Isle. Instead of exiling or killing the druids for being ‘pagan', he converted them to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. In this way, an Irish Christianity came into being that, to the canonical extent possible, was in harmony with pre-Christian spirituality.

Through the dedication and perseverance of St Patrick and his successors, Ireland became a bastion of Christianity. As a matter of fact, the Irish Church was to remain faithful to Orthodox Christianity for several centuries to come, while the rest of the Western Church, especially from the late eighth century, began increasingly to deviate from the ancient Orthodox Christian Faith. The year 500 is reckoned as the commencement of the Golden Age of the Irish Church. Over the next century monasteries would be established all over Ireland. The unprecedented upsurge of Christianity in this part of the world can be witnessed from the fact that in the first 250 years following St Patrick's arrival, Eire produced around 500 recognized saints. None of them was martyred, except on the Continent, which confirms the existence of a close affinity between the ancient Christian Faith and traditional Irish spirituality.