Please forgive any typos i have made:-

Writing in italics are quotations interspersed throughout the booklet.

PATRICK
THE APOSTLE OF IRELAND
NO EMISSARY OF ROME

by
IAN R.K. PAISLEY, M.P, M.E.P

© Copyright Ian R. K. Paisley First printed March 2000
Published by
European Institute of Protestant Studies
Martyrs Memorial Productions
356-376 Ravenhill Road,
Belfast,
BT6 8G|
Northern Ireland
Tel: 028 9045 7106

Patrick - the man & his message

One figure casts his shadow on the Christian history of this Emerald Isle of ours as a veritable Colossus - Patrick, Ireland's apostle of the Christian faith.

Of course his history has become tainted with legend and fantastic assertions of miracles. Our first and no simple task is to rescue the truth from the pit of Romish superstitions and falsehoods.

Patrick was kidnapped and enslaved twice.

His first kidnapping and enslaving was when, as a boy, he was stolen from his home in Scotland, to become a slave in Ireland.

The second was his kidnapping and stealing by Rome as a figure in history and enslaved in the dogmas, superstitions and priestcraft of Rome. This hijacking goes on to this day.

Legend maintains that he drove the snakes out of Ireland but certainly not the vipers in vestments who would chain him in Rome's incarceration.

The fact of the matter is that Patrick was not a papist or a priest of that faith, neither was he an emissary of the Pope, nor was he consecrated by the Pope, nor did he even mention the Pope in his writings nor any of the cardinal dogmas of Rome such as purgatory, adoration of the Virgin, the mass nor the papacy itself.

Nor was he an Irish Republican Hibernian with a green sash!

The papist Patrick is a Patrick of Rome's manipulating, a fake, and the Irish Republican Patrick is presented to us today as a Patrick of IRA manufacturing - another fake.

The learned Archbishop Ussher wrote an invaluable "Discourse on the religion professed by the Irish and British". It is an important exposure of Rome's lies which Rome has packaged under her so-called "infallibility label".

Patrick was neither trained, ordained nor consecrated by Rome, or did he preach the doctrines of Rome. He was an apostle of the true Gospel of Christ and no propagator of the false gospel of the Roman Antichrist.

WHAT ARE THE HISTORICAL FACTS?

The following facts of history are well established.

No matter how late in history Patrick is placed, the fact is that it was only centuries after he was dead that the Church of Rome was known in Ireland.

Successive attempts by various Popes failed to break the strength of the churches brought into being by the gospel which Patrick preached.

The Celtic Church, brought up on Patrick's diet of Holy Scripture, for years after his death boldly exposed the extravagant claims of the Pope. For centuries it was an anti-pope church, purer in its Biblical Christianity than any other in Europe.

Successive attempts by various Popes failed to break the strength of the churches brought into being by the Gospel which Patrick preached.

At a synod in 1110 and presided over by a papal legate the Church was placed under two archbishops and 23 diocesan bishops. Forty years after that synod of Rathbreasail the Celtic Church had not conformed. A further synod at Kells was convened by another papal legate and the number of diocesan bishops was increased to 38 but still Rome could not break the Celtic Church.

Hence the Pope decided to employ the political power to aid him in the establishing of Romanism in this island of Ireland.

THE POPE GAVE IRELAND TO THE ENGLISH AT A PRICE!

The Pope was one Nicholas Breakspear who reigned on the papal throne as Adrian IV.

He knew King Henry II of England wanted to add Ireland to his kingdom so he issued a papal bull.

Strange how in the Providence of God this bull establishes the truth about Patrick. Its wording has shattered the teaching of all Roman historians who have tried to devour it. It was issued in AD 1155. Patrick, at the latest, died in AD 493. So over six centuries later the Roman Church had not been established in Ireland.

The Bull of Adrian reads:

"His Holiness held it right that for extending the borders of the Church, restraining the progress of vice, for the correction of manners, the planting of virtue, and the increase of the Christian religion, you enter that island and execute therein whatever shall pertain to the honour of God and the welfare of the land, and that the people of that land receive you honourably, and reverence_you as their lord, the rights of their Churches still remaining sacred and inviolate, and, the prudent Pope, with a keen eye to the monetary profits of the transaction, is careful to add, 'saving to St Peter the annual pension of one penny' (equal, it is said, to at least one pound today) 'from every house'. In this audacious and high-handed style was Ireland handed bodily over to England. Irish Roman Catholics should bear carefully in mind that it is to the Pope of Rome they owe their subjugation to Britain, of which they complain so much. Being the infallible Head of an infallible Church, surely he did not err. How strange that it is the Irish Roman Catholics, headed by their own priests and bishops, who, with the sanction of the present Pope, rebel against the action of Pope Adrian IV, and are bent upon taking from England a possession with which the see of Rome gifted her!"
- Hamilton's History of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland, pages 20-21.

Rome was a modern introduction to Ireland compared with Patricks Biblical Church.

Note the aim of the invasion of Ireland was to extend the borders of the Pope's Church.

How could that be if Patrick 600 years before had established it as the church of the whole country?

No, Rome was a modern introduction to Ireland compared with Patrick's Biblical Church.

With all the controversy raging around Patrick the truth has been made public, and even prominent Romanists will not now enter the lists to defend the traditional Roman falsehood about him.

As is typical of those whom Rome creates saints, all sorts of spurious miracles are attributed to the Roman Patrick. The raising of a horse to life, after it had died for trespassing for religious purposes on special ground, a dead man holding a conversation with Patrick, an angel appearing to him like as Moses experienced out of a burning bush and many other like wonders have come from the fertile imagination of Rome's saint manufacturers.

I see this past week the present Pope, who patents saints regularly, has brought another 44 more hopefuls on their way to patented sainthood by beatifying them.

He was, however, forced to put Hitler's Pope Pius XII, Eugenio Pacelli, on the back burner of sainthood, because of the recent exposure of Pacelli's collusion with the Nazis in the extermination of the jews by John Cornwell in his book 'Hitler's Pope'. Pius XII was yet another king of the Vatican statelet stained with the blood of innocents.

Patrick tells us that his father Calpornius was a deacon, the son of Potitus a presbyter (not a Roman Catholic, for both were in the church ministry yet both were married and had families).

PATRICK, THE APOSTLE OF IRELAND

But let us turn to the fact of Patrick the Apostle of Ireland. Only two authentic writings of Patrick are extant. If we stick to them alone we will be dealing with real facts and not Roman fallacies.

Those are his Confession and his Epistle to Caroticus.

In a recent book on Patrick by the present Roman Catholic Bishop of Clogher, Dr Duffy, an autographed copy of which he kindly sent to me, that view of the genuineness of these two writings is upheld and defended.

We are on firm ground when we stick to these documents for the real truth about Patrick.

Patrick tells us that his father Calpornius was a deacon, the son of Potitus a presbyter (not a Roman Catholic, for both were in the church ministry yet both were married and had families).

He states that his fathers came from a village called Bannavem Taberniae. He calls what was Roman Britain his country.

There is a place called Kilpatrick (i.e. the Church of Patrick) situated near Dunbarton in the Firth of Clyde, part of Roman Britain.

It could be that this is where Patrick first saw the light of day. So the patron saint of Ireland was in reality a Scot.

Let him speak for himself. The following, except otherwise stated, is from Patrick's Confession.

A SINNER AND ONLY A SINNER

'Patrick, a sinner, the rudest and the least of all the faithful, and most contemptible to very many, had for my father Calpornius, a deacon, a son of Potitus a presbyter, who dwelt in the village of Bannavem Taberniae for he had a small farm hard by the place where I was taken captive.'

A SINNER ENSLAVED

'I was then nearly sixteen years of age. I did not know the true God; and I was taken to Ireland in captivity with so many thousand men. in accordance with our deserts, because we were departed from God, and we kept not His precepts, and were not obedient to our priests, who admonished us for our salvation.

'And there the Lord opened (to me) the sense of my unbelief, that, though late, I might remember my sins, and that I might return with my whole heart to the Lord my God'

And the Lord brought down upon us 'the wrath of His indignation' and dispersed us among many nations, even to the end of the earth, where now my littleness is seen among foreigners.'

A SINNER SAVED BY GRACE

And there the Lord opened (to me) the sense of my unbelief, that, though late, I might remember my sins, and that I might return with my whole heart to the Lord my God, who had respect to my humiliation, and pitied my youth and ignorance, and took care of me before I knew Him, and before I had wisdom, or could discern between good and evil; and protected me and comforted me as a father does a son.'

A SINNER HUMBLE TO THE END

'Since indeed I myself, now in my old age, strive after what I did not learn in my youth, because they prevented me from learning thoroughly that which I had read through before. But who believes me. although I should say as I have already said? When a youth, nay almost a boy in words. I was taken captive, before I knew what I ought to avoid. Hence I blush today, and greatly fear to expose my unskilfulness, because, not being eloquent, I cannot express myself with clearness and brevity, nor even as the spirit moves, and the mind is endowed understanding point out.'

THE SINNER EXILED YET JOYFUL

'From wherever he came, the Ballymena district can undoubtedly claim that the bare feet of the poor slave boy, who was afterwards to win for himself an imperishable renown as one of Ireland's best benefactors, walked through its fields, climbed the steep sides of Slemish, and from its summit doubtless many a time gazed wistfully across the sea to where on the horizon he could dimly descry the hills of his native Scotland.'
- Hamilton's History of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland.

A SINNER LED

'But after I had come to Ireland I daily used to feed cattle, and I prayed frequently during the day: the love of God and the fear of Him increased more and more, and faith became stronger,

"And they cried out thus as if with one voice, 'We entreat thee, holy youth, that thou come, and henceforth waH^among us.' And I was deeply moved in heart, and could read no further..."

and the spirit was stirred: so that in one day I said about a hundred prayers, and in the night nearly the same: so that I used even to remain in the woods and in the mountain; before daylight I used to rise to prayer, through snow, through frost, through rain, and felt no harm; nor was there any slothfulness in me, as I now perceive, because the spirit was then fervent within me.

And there indeed one night, in my sleep, I heard a voice saying to me, "Thou fastest well [fasting so], thou shalt soon go to thy country.' And again, after a very short time, I heard a response saying to me, 'Behold, thy ship is ready'. And it was not near, but perhaps two hundred miles away, and I never had been there, nor was I acquainted with any of the men there.
'After this I took flight, and left the man with whom I had been six years; and I came in the strength of the Lord, who directed my way for good: and I feared nothing till I arrived at that ship. And on that same day on which I arrived, the ship moved out of its place, and I asked them (the sailors) that I might go away and sail with them. And it displeased the captain, and he answered sharply with indignation, 'Do not by any means seek to go with us.' And when I heard this. I separated myself from them in order to go to the hut where I lodged. And on the way I began to pray: and before I had ended my prayer I heard one of them, and he was calling loudly after me. 'Come Quickly, for these men are calling you.' And immediately I returned to them, and they began to say to me, 'Come, for we receive you in good faith, make friendship with us in whatever way you wish.' And in that day I accordingly disdained to make friendship with them, on account of the fear of God. But in very deed I hoped of them that they would come into the faith of Jesus Christ, because they were heathen, and on account of this I clave to them. And we sailed immediately.'

A SINNER CALLED

'And again, after a few years, I was in the Britains with my parents, who received me as a son, and earnestly besought me that, now at least, after the many hardships I had endured, I would never leave them again. And there I saw, indeed, in the bosom of the night, a man coming as it were from Ireland. Victoricus by name, with innumerable letters, and he gave one of them to me. And I read the beginning of the letter containing "The Voice of the Irish." And while I was reading aloud the beginning of the letter. I myself thought indeed in my mind that I heard the voice of those who were near the wood of Foclut, which is close by the Western Sea. And they cried out thus as if with one voice, 'We entreat thee, holy youth, that thou come, and henceforth walk among us.' And I was deeply moved in heart, and could read no further; and so I awoke. Thanks be to God, that after very many years the Lord granted to them according to their cry!

'And on another night, I know not, God knows, whether in me. or near me, with most eloquent words which I heard, and could not understand, except at the end of the speech one spoke as follows, 'He who gave His life for thee is He who speaks in thee:' and so I awoke full of joy. And again I saw Him praying in me, and He was as it were, within my body, and I heard above me, that is, above the inner man, and there He was praying mightily with groanings.

And meanwhile I was stupefied and astonished, and pondered who it could be that was praying in me. But at the end of the prayer He so spoke as if He were the Spirit. And so I awoke, and remembered that the Apostle says, The Spirit helps the infirmities of our prayers. For we know not what we should pray for as we ought; but the Spirit Himself asketh for us with unspeakable groanings,' which cannot be expressed in words. And again, (he says) The Lord is our advocate, and prays for us.'

A SINNER IN DEBT

"For I am greatly a debtor to the God who has bestowed on me such grace, that many people through me should be born again to God, and that everywhere clergy should be ordained for a people newly coming to the faith, whom the Lord took from the ends of the earth, as He had promised of old by His prophets: `To Thee the Gentiles will come and say, As our fathers made false idols, and there is no profit in them.' And again: 'I have set Thee to be the light of the Gentiles, that Thou mayest be for salvation unto the utmost part of the earth.' And there I am willing to wait the promise of Him who never fails, as He promises in the Gospel: `They shall come from the east and the west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob:' as we believe that believers shall come from all the world.

'Therefore it becomes us to fish well and diligently, as the Lord premonishes and teaches, saying: 'Come ye after Me, and I will make you fishers of men. 'And again He says by the prophets: 'Behold I send many fishers and hunters, saith the Lord.' Therefore it is very necessary to spread our nets, so that a copious multitude and crowd may be taken for God, and that everywhere there may be clergy, who shall baptise and exhort a people needy and anxious, as the Lord admonishes and teaches in the Gospel, saying: 'Going, therefore, teach ye all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit ... even to the end of the age.' And again:

''Whence, then, has it come to pass that in Ireland they who never had any knowledge, anduntilnow have only worshiped idols and unclean things, have lately become a people of the Lord, and are called the sons of God."

'Going, therefore, into the whole world, preach the Gospel to every creature. He that believeth not shall be condemned."

A SINNER AND A BRINGER OF SINNERS

'[And again: "This Gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world, for a testimony to all nations, and then shall the consummation come." And also the Lord, foretelling by the prophet, says: 'And it shall be in the last days, saith the Lord, I will pour out of My Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophecy, and your sons shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. And upon My servants indeed and upon My handmaids I will pour out in those days of My Spirit, and they shall prophesy' And in Osee He says: 'I will call that which was not My people My people ... and her who had not obtained mercy: and it shall be in the place where it was said, You are not My people, there they shall be called the sons of the living God.']

'Whence, then, has it come to pass that in Ireland they who never had any knowledge, and until now have only worshiped idols and unclean things, have lately become a people of the Lord, and are called the sons of God."

A SINNER SAYS FAREWELL

'Behold, I will, again and again, declare briefly the words of my Confession. I testify in truth, and in joy of heart, before God and His holy angels, that I never had any reason, except the Gospel and its promises, for ever returning to that people from whom I had formerly escaped with difficulty.

'But I beg of those who believe and fear God. whoever shall deign to look into or receive this writing which Patrick the sinner, unlearned indeed, has written in Ireland, that no one

In his Confession he tells about his call to Ireland and never spokg. of the "Pope who is supposed to have made him a Bishop and sent him to Ireland.

may ever say, if I have done or demonstrated anything according to the will of God, however little, that it was my ignorance (which did it). But judge ye, and let it be most truly believed, that it has been the gift of God. And this is my confession before I die.'

PATRICK'S MESSAGE

Rome claims Patrick to have been the Pope's man in Ireland.

Patrick knew nothing about what modern Romanists declare of him.

He is depicted attired in full ecclesiastical costume - a giant mitre on his head, a great crozier in his hand and garbed in a costume of which he had never heard or seen, let alone wore.

Patrick never wore mass vestments. His teaching was as different from Rome as heaven is from hell.

In his Confession he tells about his call to Ireland and never spoke of the Pope who is supposed to have made him a bishop and sent him to Ireland.

There was a man sent from God (not from any Pope) to Ireland whose name was Patrick.

There is no authentic document of the time which has anything whatever to say of his connection with the Pope. There is not even a hint of it.

Surely if Patrick had been the Pope's emissary and turned the whole island to Christianity, Christendom would have rung with papal praises for Patrick. Leo I, Pope from 440-461, wrote many letters but he evidently did not know or recognise Patrick as one of his flock for he does not mention him at all.

The Roman connection with Patrick is totally fictitous.

Patrick came preaching not popery and its dogmas, but the Bible and its pure divinely revealed Gospel doctrines. Patrick was at odds with the cardinal doctrines of Rome.

His appeal was ever to the Scriptures.

I. He preached the Divinely revealed trinity of the Godhead with exceedingly great scriptural emphasis, uncorrupted by Rome's usurpation of Mary on to God's throne. In fact Rome preaches antichrist dogma and so denies the Father and the Son, I John 2:22 "He is antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son". Pushing Mary as the Mother of God on to God's throne is a blasphemous denial of the Triune God revealed in Holy Scripture. Its aim is to push God off His own throne and make Mary coequal with Christ in the great work of redemption. Patrick writes:
"Because there is no other God, neither ever was, neither before, nor shall be hereafter, except God the Father, unbegotten, without beginning. From whom is all beginning: upholding all things, as we have said: and His Son Jesus Christ, whom indeed with the Father, we testify to have always been, before the origin of the world, spiritually with the Father; in an inexplicable manner begotten before all beginning: and by Himself were made the things visible and invisible: and was made man: (and), death having been vanquished, was received into the heavens to the Father. And He has given to Him all power above every name of those that are in heaven, on earth, and under the earth, that every tongue should confess to Him that Jesus Christ is Lord and God, in whom we believe, and expect [His] coming, to be ere long 'the Judge of the living and of the dead,' 'who will render to every one according to his deeds.' And He hath 'poured upon us abundantly' the Holy Spirit, a gift and pledge of immortality; who makes the faithful and obedient to become 'sons of God, and joint-heirs with Christ': whom we confess and adore one God in the Holy Trinity of the sacred name.'

II. What of Clerical Celibacy?
His father Calpornius, an ecclesiastic, was married, his grandfather Potitus, also an ecclesiastic, was also married. Patrick himself appointed many married men to be pastors or bishops of the churches he formed.

III. Auricular Confession.
Confession to a priest for pardon has no place or mention in Patrick's ministry or work.

IV. He celebrated no masses nor made any mention of transubstantiation.
The changing of the sacramental symbols into the actual body and blood of Christ and offering them for the sins of the living and the dead was neither believed in nor preached by Patrick.

V. He knew nothingof the last rites of the Roman Church and never anointed the dying with oil.

VI. His view of salvation ran contrary to Rome.
He preached that all were sinners, including the Virgin Mary, and only by God"s free grace and Christ's blood freely shed could they be saved.

VII. His call to sinners was 'Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sins of the world'.

VIII. His gospel was not salvation by water baptism but by wonderful grace.
All the adults he baptised only when they became by saving faith the sons of God, and these numbered many tens of thousands. The churches he set up had a single bishop or pastor over them. He was never Primate of Ireland.

IX. He did not gain money by his services.
Freely he had received. Freely he gave. He was able at the end of his ministry to challenge his hearers, like Samuel of old and say (I Samuel 12:2-5) "I have walked before you from my childhood unto this day. Behold, here I am: witness against me before the Lord, and before his anointed: whose ox have I taken? or whose ass have I taken? or whom have I defrauded? whom have I oppressed? or of whose hand have I received any bribe to blind mine eyes therewith? and I will restore it you. And they said, Thou hast not defrauded us, nor oppressed us, neither hast thou taken ought of any man's hand."

Listen to his own words: -

'But perhaps, since I have baptised so many thousand men, I might have expected half a screpall from some of them? Tell it to me, and I will restore it to you. Or when the Lord ordained everywhere clergy, through my humble ministry, I dispensed the rite gratuitously. If I asked of any of them even the price of my shoe, tell it against me, and I will restore you more. I spent for you, that they might receive me; and among you, and everywhere, I travelled for your sake, amid many perils, even to remote places, where there was no one beyond, and where no one else had ever penetrated - to baptise or ordain clergy, or to confirm the people. The Lord is granting it, I diligently and

'I pray God that He may give me perseverance, and count me worthy to render my self a faithful witness to Him'

most cheerfully, for your salvation, defrayed all things. During this time I gave presents to the kings: besides which I gave pay to their sons who escorted me; and nevertheless they seized me, together with my companions. And on that day they eagerly desired to kill me: but the time had not yet come. And they seized all the things that they found with us, and they also bound me with iron. And on the fourteenth day the Lord set me free from their power; and whatever was ours was restored to us, for God's sake, and the attached friends whom we had before provided.'

'But you know how much I paid to those who acted as judges throughout all the regions which I more frequently visited. For I think that I distributed among them not less than the hire of fifteen men. So that you might enjoy me, and I may always enjoy you in the Lord, I do not regret it, nor is it enough for me -I still 'spend, and will spend for your souls.' God is mighty, and may He grant to me that in future I may spend myself for your souls. Behold. 'I call God to witness upon my soul' 'that I lie not:' neither that you may have occasion, for because I hope for honour from any man. Sufficient to me is honour which is not belied. But I see that now I am exalted by the Lord above measure in the present age: and I was not worthy, nor deserving that He should aid me in this: since I know that poverty and calamity suit me better than riches and luxuries. But Christ the Lord was poor for us.'

'But I, poor and miserable, even if I wished for riches, yet have them not, 'neither do I judge my own self;' because I daily expect either murder, or to be circumvented, or to be reduced to slavery, or mishap of some kind. But 'I fear none of these things,' on account of the promises of the heavens: for I have cast myself into the hands of the Omnipotent God, who rules everywhere, as saith the prophet. 'Cast thy thought on the Lord, and He will sustain thee.-

'Behold now, I commend my souls to my most faithful God, for whom I discharge an embassage in my ignoble condition, because indeed He does not accept the person, and He chose me to this office, that I might be one of the least of His ministers. But 'what shall I render Him for all the things that he hath rendered to me? But what shall I say, or what shall I promise to my Lord? Because I have no power, unless He has given it to me, but He searches "the heart and reins;' because I desire enough and too much, and am prepared that He should give me 'to drink of His cup,' as He has granted to others that love Him.'

'Wherefore may it never happen to me from my Lord, to lose His people, (people) whom He has gained in the utmost parts of the earth. I pray God that He may give me perseverance, and

"... 'Without any doubt zue shall rise in that day in the brightness of the sun, that is, in the glory of Jesus Christ, our Redeemer, as 'sons of the living Qod,' and 'joint-heirs with Christ'., and to be 'conformable to "His image'..."

count me worthy to render myself a faithful witness to Him, even till my departure, on account of my God. And if I have ever imitated anything good on account of my God, whom I love, I pray Him to grant me, that with those proselytes and captives, I may pour out my blood for His name's sake, even although I myself may even be deprived of burial, and my corpse most miserably be torn limb from limb by dogs, or by wild beasts, or that the fowls of heaven should devour it. I believe most certainly that if this should happen to me, I shall have gained both soul and body. Because without any doubt we shall rise in that day in the brightness of the sun, that is, in the glory of Jesus Christ, our Redeemer, as 'sons of the living God.' and 'joint-heirs with Christ.' and to be 'conformable to His image;' for 'of Him, and through Him, and in Him" we shall reign.'

THE BREASTPLATE OR PATRICKS HYMN

While not having the same authentic standing of the Confession Patrick's letter to Caroticus, it is generally agreed Patrick's hymn is of great antiquity.

Its language corresponds with the circumstances of Patrick setting out on his missionary visit to Tara to confront in its own stronghold the idolatry which was then rampant in the land.

Notice contrary to papal writers Patrick depended not on his own miraculous powers but on the Almighty God alone for protection and deliverance.

If this hymn was not from the pen of Patrick himself it was from one well able to set forth his beliefs and faith.

THE WRITINGS OF PATRICK - THE HYMN, OR BREASTPLATE