Slainte mhor agus a h-uile beannachd duibh

I have been looking at a couple of things this week.

But first...A few people have suggested that I have been going great guns on the learning part of sabbatical but maybe not doing quite so well on the rest and rejuvenation part. I may have mentioned to a couple of members of my family that writing a blog on Friday or Saturday night is a lot like writing a sermon. Hmmm...maybe that was a mistake. So, I have been thinking about that...and likely they are correct. So...

This week I have been looking at a couple of things...slowly...and I will try to keep the next few blogs a bit shorter.

I am working through a book by John T. McNeill called The Celtic Churches. It is a history from 200 to 1200 C.E. The first chapter is a bit of history on where the Celtic people came from and where they traveled over the centuries. Likely coming from north of the Alps down into France and Italy. From France (Gaul) tribes of Celts traveled into Asia Minor and settled in a place they called Galatia. St. Paul had a few things to say to the Celts of Galatia. They were used as mercenaries.

Galatian spearmen

McNeill moves on to talk about the coming of Christianity into Britain where other tribes of Celts settled and how the Pagan Celt reacted to the coming of this new religion. Druids were the clergy of these Celts.

That may be enough academic stuff for this blog.

The other area I have started to look at this week is prayers and blessings from Celtic spirituality. I enjoy the blessings that have come out of Scotland and Ireland. We have some idea of the words when I say the title...The Irish Blessing...though there are many of them.

Here are two Scottish blessings that I found this week.

May the blessing of light be on you - light without and light within. 
May the blessed sunlight shine on you like a great peat fire, 
so that stranger and friend may come and warm himself at it. 
And may light shine out of the two eyes of you, 
like a candle set in the window of a house, 
bidding the wanderer come in out of the storm.
And may the blessing of the rain be on you, 
may it beat upon your Spirit and wash it fair and clean,
and leave there a shining pool where the blue of Heaven shines, 
and sometimes a star. 
And may the blessing of the earth be on you, 
soft under your feet as you pass along the roads, 
soft under you as you lie out on it, tired at the end of day; 
and may it rest easy over you when, at last, you lie out under it. 
May it rest so lightly over you that your soul may be out from under it quickly; up and off and on its way to God. 
And now may the Lord bless you, and bless you kindly. Amen.

I am not sure why the font changed on that.

The second blessing is the Gaelic one that is the title of this blog. 

Slainte mhor agus a h-uile beannachd duibh

Good health and every good blessing to you.

That is my wish for you this coming week.