Saint Patrick's Day

In Ireland St Patrick´s Day is an important religious holiday. It is celebrated on March 17 to honor Patrick, Ireland´s patron saint. Business are closed and people go to church. In 1995 the Irish goverment started the St Patrick´s Day Festival, a four-day festival in the capital city, Dublin. On St Patrick´s Day there are a lot of tricolour flags in the streets. Irish people created this flag in 1848 with a special meaning. The green represents Irish Catholics (mostly from the south of Ireland) and the orange represents Irish protestants (mostly from the north of Ireland). The white rectangle in the middle represents the hope for peace between Catholics and Protestants.

BUT WHO WAS SAINT PATRICK?
Saint Patrick was probably born in Wales, in about AD 389: his father was a Christian. When Patrick was sixteen years old some pirates took him to Ireland, where he became a slave. After six years he escaped to France. He became a priest there.
He returned to Ireland as a bishop in about 432. he converted a lot of Irish people to Christianity, and he introduced the Roman alphabet to Ireland. he wrote his autobiography in Latin about his life and work in reland. he died in about 461.
There are legends about St Patrick. One legend says he took all the snakes in Ireland to the top of a mountain and pushed them into the sea. Another legend says he used the shamrock to teach the Irish about Christianity: he used the three leaves of this plant to explain that for Christian God is three beings at the same time.