Happy St. Maewyn Succat Day!

That's the name St. Patrick was born with.

Here is a post on St. Patrick himself I did on a previous March 17.

And even though my grandmother's home town, Downpatrick- the place in Ireland most associated with Patrick, and where he, St. Columba, and St. Brigid are all buried- is in Ulster, some Ulstermen in America face something of a quandary as to what color to wear today. Here is a meditation on that subject.

But I thought that this year I'd share a favorite St. Paddy's day peeve of mine.

At the top of this post is a shamrock, symbol of Ireland, Irishness, and St. Paddy.

Directly below it is a four-leaf clover. It is a symbol of good luck- and nothing else.

Now, contrary to what many people think (florists make a lot of money selling shamrocks every year about this time), the shamrock is not some exotic Irish plant. It's simple clover. But its significance lies precisely in the fact that it has three leaves- no more, and no less.

It's associated with St. Patrick and with Ireland because, according to legend, Patrick used it to illustrate the doctrine of the Holy Trinity. "Luck o' the Irish" or not, to confuse it with the four-leaf clover is to destroy its entire symbolism- and thus, its significance.

This is a particular sore point with me because the bartender at my favorite German pub insists on tracing a four-leaf clover in the head of my Guinness. And she's a Notre Dame fan, so she should know better.

Anyway, this is no nit I'm picking here. The inappropriate display of the four-leaf clover on St. Patrick's Day, and its confusion with the shamrock, is obviously inadvertent, in most cases. But it's still just one more post-modern desecration of a Christian symbol which serves the purpose of obscuring its significance, thus- however unintentionally- making it, as the Burger Court called the Nativity scene, "a culturally neutral symbol of the (holiday) season, useful for commercial purposes, but devoid of any inherent meaning."

St. Patrick's Day is the feast day of a great Christian missionary. Yes, I'll have my corned beef and cabbage today, and raise a couple of Guinnii and/or Bushmills'. But St. Patrick's is first and foremost a Christian commemoration, not a superstitious, pagan celebration of "luck" or an excuse to get drunk.

The great Christian missionary whom we honor today would have some rather harsh words to say, in fact, about both.

ADDENDUM: Sigh. Not only did she do the four-leaf clover on my Guinness again tonight, but I saw an ad for Beamish- another Irish stout- covered with four-leaf clovers.

We live in a post-modern world.