Like many holidays that America adopts, St. Patrick’s Day has become a nationwide celebration. Every March 17th, “St. Patty’s Day” commemorates the holiday with parades, festivals, music, food, and dancing. However, it started off as a much more low key religious holiday.

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St. Patrick’s Day was initially recognized because of the patron St. Patrick, and since then became a celebration of all Irish culture. St. Patrick moved to Ireland later in life; he actually wasn’t Irish or from Ireland at all, and began teaching about Christianity. He ended up converting many of the country’s people to Christians. The day he died was March 17th which is the day the Irish celebrate.

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Although the patron St. Patrick is a true story to why the holiday is celebrated, many traditions were adopted in America that don’t have anything to do with him. The fact that in America we play Irish music and have parties is far from why the Irish were celebrating, but it’s how the holiday is known now. An example of the adaptations is how it was more common for St. Patrick to use a three leaf clover for his teaching. However, the four leaf clover is rarer and considered good luck so it was implemented in the holiday. The green is obviously due to Ireland, except it had little to do with the patron himself.

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While in Ireland it is celebrated more holy, the Irish-American people have adapted this holiday in many ways to enjoy the celebration year-round. Actually, bars, or “pubs” were closed on this day in Ireland until the 70’s. So, why did America embrace this holiday and turn it into a party? For starters, America was a place for immigrants to come and find freedom, and they would bring their culture or religion with them. The first documented celebration of the holiday was in Philadelphia. It was meant to honor St. Patrick and bring relief to the Irish immigrants in the city. From them on, Irish Americans made it a point to celebrate in the country. Similarly, and luckily, many Americans already practice Christianity so celebrating this holiday with them was like practicing their own religion. Also, the Irish-Americans wanted to celebrate their culture and found a way to include their entire community. As for why America turned it into a day for drinking, traditionally Irish were allowed to put aside Lenten restrictions on the day of celebrating the patron and they would drink on the holiday with their feast. This could add into the idea of why America commercialized it as a drinking holiday, or it could simply be because St. Patrick’s Day is a day to party and parade which often means to drink as well.

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Although many people do take this day to their advantage of having fun, many also still attend mass or services on this day. Just as many traditions have been adapted to other religious holidays like Easter, St. Patrick’s Day is one holiday with many versatile meanings and many ways to remember the patron St. Patrick.