Patrick isn't really a Saint with a capital S, having never been officially canonized by Rome. And he couldn't have driven the snakes out of Ireland because there were never any snakes there to begin with. He wasn't even the first evangelist to Ireland (Palladius had been sent in 431,about five years before Patrick went). Patrick isn't even Irish. He's from what's now Dumbarton, Scotland.
Patrick was 16 years old in about the year 405, when he was captured in a raid and became a slave in Ireland. Far from home, he clung to the religion he had ignored as a teenager. But forced to tend his master's sheep, he spent his six years of bondage mainly in prayer. He escaped at the suggestion of a dream and returned home. Patrick was in his mid-40s when he returned to Ireland. His strategy was to convert chiefs first, who would then convert their clans through their influence.
Though he was not solely responsible for converting the island, Patrick was quite successful. He made missionary journeys all over Ireland, and it soon became known as one of Europe's Christian centers. This, of course, was very important to fifth-century Christians, for whom Ireland was one of the "ends of the earth."
Excerpt from Christianity Today 08/2008
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