The highest Holy Day on the Irish calendar is March 17th, Saint Patrick’s Day.  This year it falls the 3rd Wednesday of the month, on our regular AOH division’s general meeting night. Due to this conflict of vital interest, the division’s general meeting will be held on the 2nd Wednesday of the month, March 10th at 7:30 pm.

The officers meeting will be at 6 pm prior to the meeting, not the first wed. of the month, March 3rd. I will send a notice out again as a reminder later this week. Information on parades will be sent out soon as transportation is arranged. Check your email.

Bro. Ed Barry, President

This was the last ship to have been built in the Republic of Ireland, constructed at Verlome Dockyard at Rushbrrok, Cork and completed in 1984. What a great opportunity to see this ship named after Eithne, a tragic heroine and the daughter of the one-eyed Fomorian King, Balor in an early Irish romantic tale. It is currently the flagship of the Irish Naval Service.

Any AOH group requesting an event with the ship or crew could then be coordinated with Penn’s Landing’s Ship Coordinator.

Our plan is to have a sponsored march complete with Bagpipe bands, Irish and Scottish dancers, AOH divisions, clubs, teams from local Pubs, Celtic Cultural Alliance members and supporters, Celtic Classic Volunteers, and friends of the Festival. Hopefully we will have State Representatives, Congressmen and our own City Mayor and council – if possible all in kilts if possible.

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Saturday May 30th 2009
7am Shotgun Start…4 player scramble format
(Lunch to follow)
Iron Lakes Country Club
3265 Shankweiler Rd
Allentown, PA 18104
                                      
$100 per golfer. $150 hole sponsorships available (signage provided at hole)
RSVP # of players by April 15th, 2009 to: kellyannrooneymemorial@gmail.com
Proceeds to Benefit Brain Tumor Research and the Kelly Chaya-Rooney Memorial Scholarship Fund at St. Joseph the Worker School.

Bro. Peters was a member since Dec. 2007.

Nick wasn’t able to attend many meetings because of work schedule. Some of you may know Nick from the Colombian Home where he worked in the restaurant on the wait staff. He worked Thursday evening and went home not feeling well. Bro. Peters was only 26 years old.
Please keep Bro. Nicholas Peters, his family and friends in your prayers.

Callaghan’s, along with other pubs in the Lehigh Valley are stepping up to support the Classic.  We have volunteered to sponsor a “Hell or High Water” fundraiser on Saturday April 4th.  The Celtic group Blackwater is performing gratis, and Coors Brewing and O’Hara’s have donated beverage for the event.  With your help we can play a role to preserve the Celtic Classic.

Jack Callaghan’s Ale House
April 4th, 2009
Tickets are $10 a person

• Door prize ticket
• Wristband
• 2 Free Beers
• Jello Shots
• Doors open at 4pm
• Music starts at 7pm
• Chinese Auction
• Celtic Classic Merchandise Store

By Dan O’Donnell
WTMJ-TV and JSOnline.com

We may all be a little bit Irish today, but how many of us know how St. Patrick’s Day began? How many of us know who the real St. Patrick really was?

“Well he was not a leprechaun who drank green beer or had a blarney stone or a pot of gold,” explains historian William Federer, who wrote St. Patrick: The Real History of His Life, From Tragedy to Triumph. “He was actually a missionary and he converted 120,000 druids from paganism to Christianity.”

In fact, Federer contends that in the fifth century A.D., Patrick did more than perhaps anyone in history to spread this new religion through Europe.

“He started over 300 churches and used the three-leafed clover to teach the [Holy] Trinity,” Federer says, noting that this teaching tool is now the symbol of St. Patrick’s Day and Ireland itself.

Patrick himself, though, was actually born in nearby Wales.

“Different Viking tribes began attacking and carrying away slaves, and Patrick was one of those carried away as a slave to Ireland,” says Federer. “He was there from 16 years old to 22 years old, when he had a dream in which he heard the Lord tell him to escape. So he did.”

“He went to the shore and, sure enough, there was a boat. He hopped aboard and hitchhiked his way across Europe and made his way back to Britain. His life was pretty uneventful until he was 40 years old, when he had another dream. That’s when things started to get interesting.”

That was when Patrick returned to Ireland as a missionary.

“His style was evangelism was to walk right into the smoky dens of these chieftans. The druids knew that this new religion was going to displace them, and so they tried killing him at least a dozen times. Once he was held for two weeks, and [the druid ruler] was holding him to kill him.”

But the chieftan instead spared Patrick and even gave him money to build his first church. For the rest of his life, Patrick preached about Jesus Christ, spread Christianity across the British Isles, and spoke out against slavery. Some historians even call him the world’s first abolitionist!

The Roman Catholic Church made him a saint in 664 A.D.

“It wasn’t until 1846, when there was a potato famine in Ireland, and millions of Irish Catholics came to America,” Federer says. “The Irish population went from two percent to 20 percent in just a decade. Half of New York City was now Roman Catholic Irish! The same thing happened in Boston, and there was an anti-immigrant, anti-Catholic, anti-Irish backlash.”

“When they had their first parade, it was more of a political statement. In Ireland, it didn’t matter how many of them there were, they didn’t have a voice in Parliament. But in America, when they had their first parade and 15,000 of them showed up, politicians in New York City said, ‘wait a minute, they haven’t decided who to vote for yet,’ so they decided to march with them.”

From those early parades, St. Patrick’s Day gained popularity as the Irish immigrants who celebrated it gained acceptance until finally both became the indispensible parts of American culture that they are today.

Sent: Sun, 8 Mar 2009 11:47:34 +0000 (UTC)

Subject: British Soldiers Killed

The killing of two British Soldiers at Massereene Barracks outside Belfast last night is condemned by The Ancient Order of Hibernians and condolences go out to their families. Whoever carried out this act can only be trying to undermine the peace agreement which has been voted on by a vast majority of the people of Ireland. For ten years now people are living a peaceful life and the children of tommorow deserve to be raised with that peace for the first time in over 40 years.

The AOH Preamble states that we should “aid and advance by all legitimate means the aspirations and endeavors of the Irish people for complete and absolute independence, promoting peace and unity for all Ireland”. We have and continue to live those words and were a big force in achieving the agreement of peace we have today. There are those still out there who for whatever reason are determined to undermine that Good Friday agreement. We have supported republicanism for centuries and will continue to do so to achieve our goal of complete freedom from foreign rule.

We now have a vehicle to attain that end and that is a peaceful,democratic political machine to reach our goal and those who want to destroy it must not succeed. We have changed from the bullet to the ballot box and we as Hibernians must work diligently to support the peace process and defeat those who’s aim is to destroy it. Pray that this is not the start of a campaign of killing and maiming by those responsible for the killings of those soldiers last night.