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The legend of Brigid | Program for Adult Searchers
The legend of Brigid
'I was a stranger and you took me in.'
This program is centered around St Brigid of Ireland, who established
various gathering places around wells across the country, as
she travelled to tell the Christian story to the Celtic peoples. The 'Wells' became
sacred places of prayer and of healing and are to be found there
today.
 An old legend involving Brigid tells us that during one of
the earliest famines in Ireland circa the 6th century Brigid's
parents were forced to leave home in search of food for the family.
Brigid was left to look after the home with only a 'single
stoup of water and a bannock of bread'. Like all parents
they warned Brigid not to let anyone into the house and to
be careful with the food because there was no more. After it
got
dark two travellers came down the lane : one a man with brown
hair and a grey beard, the other a beautiful young woman. They
asked Brigid for food and water and a place to rest. She shared
the food and water with them but knew she must obey her parents
and not invite the strangers in. However she took them around
the back of the house to an old barn and tried to make them
comfortable. When she returned to her house the water stoup
was full and the
bannock of bread whole! When she looked out the window the
old barn was engulfed in bright light. She knew then that Christ
had come to earth.This legend reminds us that even when times
are hard, and the larder is low we are called to welcome the
stranger. We are called to offer hospitality and to give people
hope.
As Brigid grew up her life was characterised by an ability
both to found monastic centres and to travel the countryside
telling
the Christian story. Brigid's great monastic centre,
Kildare, attracted men and women who dedicated their lives
to the service
of others. It was a place of hope and healing, of learning
and hospitality.
To be able to make room in our lives for others, especially
strangers, is a great gift. To see Christ in others is the
beginning of
a transformative experience. As Joan Chittester says : 'When
I let strange people and strange ideas into my heart, a new world
begins to take shape'. When Brigid's tradition
calls us to welcome the stranger, it calls us to participate
as active
agents in the bringing forth of a new creation. As the other
is welcomed, the fire of transformation is kindled and new
possibilities open up.
What would Brigid say to us today? How would she deal with
the world whose climate is characterised so often by violence,
threats
of terrorism, mistrust, fear and suspicion?
It may be that as we face this world culture, we are acquainting
ourselves with the stranger within, a stranger who is somewhat
fearful and tentative. What is it to know oneself in times
of uncertainty?
Brigid's life calls us to that place of offering hospitality
and hope to ourselves and to others. And she insists that this
happens in community.
Brigid would tell us to interact with the stranger, to change
and be changed.
Brigid would tell us to be a community, to help one another
welcome the stranger, and she would tell us that the hospitality
of Christ
marks our hope in the midst of a world in chaos.
The voices that gather around the Well of Brigid at Kildara
Centre are raised at times to reject the status quo and to take
some
action to address issues of justice and inequity. The voices
of strangers are heard and so often transformation occurs and
hope is generated. Come and join in the various offerings of
the Program, and maybe you will find a place to speak, to be
safe and to begin to imagine and to create the kind of world
in which you and those whom you love and who love you wish
to live.
A key obligation and value in the Judeo-Christian tradition
is to treat the 'stranger' well. As Exodus 22 says 'You
shall not molest or oppress the alien, for you were aliens
yourselves in the land of Egypt'.
Brigid's Well is about giving ourselves and others courage
and support to change the world, and to create the community
where we care for the stranger, comfort the most vulnerable,
serve the destitute and be Christ for those in need. When
Jesus and the woman from Samaria met at the well in the heat
of mid-day,
they were mutual strangers both in need. The subsequent conversation
transformed each of them, filling them with the waters of
hope.
Scattered across Ireland today there are countless wells named
after Brigid, and associated with these wells are healing,
hope, hospitality and blessing for people in need. One can easily
imagine
the water from those wells, coursing through mother earth and
reaching the Antipodes and flowing through our Australian waterways.
It is no accident that today our Brigid's Well at Kildara
Centre, is situated on a very ancient aboriginal site consisting
of a huge underground spring. Imagine it as a watering hole for
our indigenous sisters and brothers in ancient times. Today it
is covered with layers and layers of concrete, buildings, roads
etc., yet evidence of its existence and movement is still clear,
its dampness quite pervasive, and its power ever present.
Now in this 21st century part of this ancient watering hole is
transformed into a place for searchers of hope, for people
who seek life-giving interaction, creative prayer experiences,
deeper understanding of God, discussion of current events and
value systems, involvement in issues of justice and the exploration
of spirituality today. We have named our Program 'Brigid's
Well' remembering the pre and post Christian traditions
where the Sacred Wells in Ireland were places where communities
gathered for healing, hope, prayer and sustenance.
Oh come to the water all who are thirsty:
Though you have nothing, I bid you come
And be filled with the goodness I have to offer you.
Come, listen, live. (Is. 55)
Program
for Adult Searchers
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