Christopher Bamford

Celtic Christianity Christopher Bamford

"Our God is the God of Heaven and Earth, of sea and river, of sun and moon and stars, of the lofty mountain and lowly valley." -- St. Patrick These words are perhaps the epitome of the Celtic monk's holy embrace of nature and sense of "ecology." Everywhere in Celtic Ireland, on rocky promontories and lonely hillsides, in hermitages and monasteries, we find a holy intimacy of human, natural, and divine. In this anthology, the stories of the Celtic saints are interspersed with verses, prayers, and sayings attributed to those ancient sages -- from Patrick and Brigit, through Brendan and Columba, to Aidan and Cuthbert. It is uncertain when or how Christianity first arrived at those westernmost reaches. It seems always to have been there. Legend tells us that Irish bards attended the events on Golgotha "in the spirit." In the Celtic tradition there is a continuity in cosmic process. For the Celt, Christ's death and resurrection was a healing that allows a reconciliation between humanity and nature in God. In this sense, Christianity was always in Ireland, and we seek its historical beginning in vain. If the Celtic Church had survived, perhaps the fissure between Christianity and nature, widening through the centuries, would never have fragmented our Western attitude toward nature and the universe.