Distant Relatives: St. Patrick’s Day & South Sudan

Today, all eyes and thoughts are on Europe’s third largest Island best known for potatoes, Shamrocks, and the reason for the season: St. Patrick’s Day. It has, however, not always been all bliss for the country that produced the Saint of the day, St. Patrick, as mass starvation, disease, and emigration during the Potato famine coupled with decades of violence between Catholics and Protestants brought much civil unrest. Though St. Patrick’s Day is not that popular in Africa—save for Catholics attending Lent Mass, who take… Read More