La Fheile Bhride

 1st February is St Brigid’s Day who along with St Patrick is Irelands national saint.

According to tradition during one of her travels, St Brigid went to visit a dying pagan chief. As she sat near his bed, she picked up some rushes on the floor and began weaving a cross. When he asked her what she was doing, she told him about the meaning of the cross and this led to his conversion to Christianity.

St Brigid’s cross is made from rushes or reeds and traditionally is blessed with holy water and then hung in the kitchen all year, to be burned and replaced with a newly-woven cross on the next St Brigid’s day.