We do not want these people. They are poor, disease ridden, will take jobs from Americans, strain welfare budgets. They are criminals and rapists. Practice a strange religion. They send us their worst.
Sounds like Trump talking about the Mexicans coming over the border and Muslims seeking entry to the United States.
Not Trump.
The way Americans were talking about the Irish who began immigrating to the United States around 1845.
The Irish were not liked. Feared to an extent.
The Irish did not come here to be free. They came to eat.
Disease had killed off the potato fields. Potatoes the mainstay of the Irish diet. Lunch and dinner. Sometimes, even breakfast. Estimated Irish men consumed 14 pounds of potatoes a day.
They brought with them Catholicism. Feared by Americans. The Papacy considered evil. Conspiracy theories rampant. The Irish would capture women. Hold them in convents. Priests rape the women. Babies born will be strangled.
You can’t make it up.
The cry became America for Americans! Return America to what it was. Which meant get rid of the Irish.
One hundred seventy years later. The Irish are assimilated. Admired. Respected. They have succeeded in every area of society. Thirty two million strong. Ten percent of the population.
Today, St. Patrick’s Day. Everyone celebrates. Everyone Irish.
The world knows St. Patrick’s story. Not all, however. I share with you an episode not well known.
St. Patrick was a child of the Fifth Century. He died this date in 461 A.D.
He had returned to Ireland. A bishop, he did all the things history attributes to him. His aim to Christianize the pagan Irish.
He was successful. Success brought with it many who were jealous of the elevated position he had achieved in Irish society. His own fellow Christians.
Women were attracted to him. He Christianized many. Some were wives of kings and others of influence. A number of the ladies left their husbands to enter the nunnery. Such not appreciated by the husbands.
Wealthy women gave him expensive gifts.
He baptized many. In the thousands. Charged a fee to perform the baptisms. Similarly for ordinations. Many became priests. He charged for the ordination of each.
St. Patrick ingratiated himself with kings and judges. A gift here, a gift there.
Sounds like a religious politico. The Christians who forced his trial thought so. They also believed he sought his bishopric with personal gain in mind.
The decision of the trial not specifically known. History rarely recorded in those days. However, St. Patrick himself in Declaration or Confessio spelled out what was required to be done by him to satisfy those against him.
St. Patrick agreed to return gifts which wealthy women had given him, stop accepting payment for baptisms, stop accepting payment for ordinations, and stop giving gifts to kings and judges.
He did. Then returned to his calling Christianizing the Irish.
Enjoy your day! Drink not too much green beer!