This coming Tuesday, March 17, is the feast day of St. Patrick, and while you might wear green or drink dyed-green beer, I suggest a different observance − listening to one of my favorite hymns: St. Patrick’s Breastplate. We don’t hear it a lot, likely because it is long − seven verses in our 1982 Hymnal and even longer in other versions!
The hymn is based on an Irish prayer of protection, or “lorica,” that is attributed to Saint Patrick. Its first words are, “I bind unto myself today,” and it goes on to call on God to be a powerful shield around the one praying. Along the way, the prayer invokes multiple aspects of the divine, beginning with the Trinity (and thus the hymn is often played on Trinity Sunday).
The hymn is also often played at ordinations, including my own to the priesthood! At a recent ordination, though, a shortened version was played, and I was sorry that one key verse − the sixth − was left out. This penultimate verse is quite unusual in that it has a different tune that is repeated twice, and the words are particularly intimate:
Christ be with me, Christ within me, Christ behind me, Christ before me, Christ beside me, Christ to win me, Christ to comfort and restore me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ in quiet Christ in danger, Christ in hearts of all that love me, Christ in mouth of friend and stranger.
The hymn then returns triumphantly to the first tune and expression of the prayer: “I bind unto myself today, the strong Name of the Trinity…” I invite you to spend some time with it this St. Patrick’s Day − it is Hymn 370 in our hymnal, and there are sung versions you can find online as well. Enjoy!
