Naming is always the first thing we do. When we name, we reveal we are creatures created in the image of God. Usually before an infant is even born a name has already been picked for him or her. Many times this name reflects the dreams; hopes and aspirations the parents have for their child. To name something is to describe it, to articulate a vision and purpose for its existence. We are choosing the name St. Patrick for the church God will raise up here because it reflects something of our own particular dreams, hopes, and aspirations for Greeley. This name connects us with a story that is literally hundreds of years old and with a fresh vision of spirituality that is lived out in the market place with real people.

St. Patrick was born in Roman occupied Britain in the fourth century. At age sixteen, Celtic warriors from Ireland raided his home and took him back to Ireland as a slave. After six years of slavery, he heard the voice of God saying, "Go home." He literally left the fields, made his way to the coast boarded a ship and sailed home. He entered the priesthood and some years later again heard the call of God to take the message of the gospel to his former captors, the Irish. When his superiors heard of his desire they at first were shocked and refused because no one to this point had even considered preaching the gospel to the barbaric polytheistic Celts who fought naked, painted their bodies with blue woad (paint), and offered human sacrifices. Little wonder because simultaneously hoards of barbarians were overrunning Christianized Europe! That anybody would attempt such a thing was considered insane from the point of view of personal longevity, much less to think one might be remotely successful. Patrick's superiors finally relented and with a cross, a chalice and faith, he went to Ireland to preach the good news of the Gospel.

Amazingly, the Irish nation was converted without bloodshed representing the first time Christianity was enculturated outside the Greco-Roman world. But unlike the Greco-Roman civilization, with it's Platonic suspicion of the body as unholy, Patrick capitalized on the Celts outright hedonistic and lewd worship of the body and of creation by explaining that the body as well as all of creation was the handiwork of a benevolent God. The major non-sequitir was that this benevolent God sacrificed Himself for the brokenness of His creation so that it could be enjoyed in the light of its original intent. This message, far from causing the Irish to separate creation into it's spiritual and desirable aspects versus its physical and evil aspects, helped give meaning and purpose to what they were already pursuing. We might say, they fell captive to the compulsive power of a new beauty (the beauty of the Gospel message). Now, all beauty was seen, understood and defined in light of the ultimate beauty. For the first time, they could keep beauty in its proper place, appreciating it without going to the beautiful for ultimate life. Now, all love was seen, understood, and defined in light of the ultimate love. Consequently, they could love not to get life, but to give life. Now, all courage and valor was seen, understood and defined in light of the ultimate courage and valor. Now rather than proving themselves by taking life, they could prove themselves by giving their lives. And this they did with great vigor pouring themselves into what has been come to be know as the monastic movement. And far from causing the Irish to despise culture the Gospel message gave them a transformed and purposed love for art, literature, and life. The converted Irish copied and preserved the European classical literature on an island safe from barbaric hoards. In time Patrick's Ireland began to send missionaries back to Europe reconnecting her to her historic roots in Christianity. They also brought with them a robust spirituality full of a love for beauty and creation. A spirituality while being very human and practical, one which was also very powerful and very divine.

Our church bears Patrick's name because we face a similar task. Many today have rejected traditional religion and are seeking life in one form of creation's abundance or another. And of course they are finding a semblance of life because after all this is God's creation, but "by-in-large" they are left empty and disillusioned. Often the response of the church to this hedonism is to say, "Naughty, naughty, naughty." No more compelling vision of true beauty and real life is offered. Consequently like Europe, before Patrick's mission, we live in a post-Christian society where a distant memory tells us we should be Christian, but where existing evidence seems non-persuasive and powerless.

Saint Patrick Presbyterian Church seeks to be part of a movement that reverses this trend.

But what will enable St. Patrick to reverse this trend any more successfully than any other church? Of course, this isn't to say that other churches aren't doing so or that such a task can be accomplished by plugging in the right formula or by implementing some new church growth technique. But we must agree that the answer to this question will reveal something of the uniqueness of St. Patrick Presbyterian Church's vision. Really our vision isn't unique. G. K. Chesterson once said, "It is not that the Gospel has been tried and found wanting, it has gone largely untried." So what we are saying is "unique" or "distinctive" in one sense isn't, but in another sense, astoundingly so. We have lost the melody to the Song we once knew. This Song is what makes life worth singing in all its varying scales of richness. We need to be taught afresh. We need a new and fresh retelling of the historic Gospel.

So St. Patrick is most distinct in its insistence on the "third-way" of the Gospel. The Gospel really is "not what you think." It's counter-intuitive. What do we mean, counter-intuitive? We naturally think that God loves us because we attempt to keep His laws, like a parent who approves of a child when he or she gets good grades. So we migrate between the poles of trying hard to keep His Law in order win his favor, or completely giving up thinking we can never meet the demands of His Law. It often never occurs to us that the purpose of God's law is to reveal our total inability to keep it in order to get us to gaze in wonder and amazement upon the beauty of Christ who kept it for us. In other words, some people think they more or less succeed in their attempts so they become good pretenders and excellent judges. Others are too honest to beguile themselves with such nonsense and settle into some pattern of disregard for God's law thinking they can never keep it anyway. But the good news is, there is another way. It is the Gospel way. The Gospel way says that God loves us not because of what we do or don’t do but because of what Christ has done. In other words, when the truth that Christ kept the law for you dawns in your soul it gives you a whole new motivation and ability to please God. The old way results in polarization between those who think God loves them because they've done a pretty good job at keeping his requirements and those who give up the struggle for holiness and throw in the towel and affirm God loves us anyway. Society-at-large demonstrates this polarization over and over again with its liberal and conservative cliches. St. Patrick Presbyterian Church might be best described by our insistence of this "third-way" of the Gospel. This is further described by our six commitments or core values.