02/01/2024
✨ Make way for your new feminine icon! ✨
Today is St. Brigid’s Day or Imbolc, the first day of Spring in Ireland. The word Imbolc or “in the belly” in old Irish Neolithic language means that Spring 🌸 is ready to be born.
☘️ St. Brigid is the only female patron saint of Ireland. Back in the day, Brigid was a peacemaker and healer with magical powers. 🪄She once “turned a wooden column into a living tree with one touch and hung her cloak on a sunbeam”. As she traveled, she performed medical miracles, including curing blindness and deafness. 🩺
She 👏 is 👏 everywhere! Among the many she protects: “babies, blacksmiths, boatmen, cattle farmers…Clan Douglas, dairymaids, dairy workers, fugitives, Ireland, 🇮🇪 Leinster, mariners, midwives, milkmaids, nuns, poets, the poor, poultry farmers, poultry raisers, printing presses, sailors, ⚓️ scholars, travelers, and watermen”.
🧣If we were waking up in Ireland, (lucky!) you would be grabbing your scarf or clothing that you left out for her to bless. Use this to rid your headache or sore throat. 👍
There are so many traditions associated with St. Brigid. Here are a few:
🧈 effigies made out of butter, known as Biddies were brought from house to house (with music, because why not?), for St. Brigid to protect this year’s profits
👶🏻 making a doll and her bed to represent Brigid (or Brideog) and also carrying her from house to house. Some women will stay home to receive the procession with a small offering of a treat or snack.
🔥 raking fire ashes smooth (don’t try this at home!) and in the morning, looking for a sign that Brigid passed through
Brigid has worked hard enough to deserve a break! Ireland agreed-St. Brigid’s Day is now an Irish national holiday. 🙌
👩🦳 St. Brigid, today we salute you.
📸: original photo by Smithsonian Magazine
