Foreign To Me

Manu mea scripsi atque condidi verba ista danda et tradenda, militibus mittenda Corotici, non dico civibus meis neque civibus sanctorum Romanorum sed civibus daemoniorum, ob mala opera ipsorum. Ritu hostili in morte vivunt, socii Scottorum atque Pictorum apostatarumque. Sanguilentos sanguinare de sanguine innocentium Christianorum, quos ego in numero Deo genui atque in Christo confirmavi! Postera die qua crismati neophyti in veste candida, flagrabat in fronte ipsorum dum crudeliter trucidati atque mactati gladio supradictis, misi epistolam cum sancto presbytero quem ego ex infantia docui, cum clericis, ut nobis aliquid indulgerent de praeda vel de captivis baptizatis quos ceperunt: cachinnos fecerunt de illis. Idcirco nescio quid magis lugeam: an qui interfecti vel quos ceperunt vel quos graviter zabulus inlaqueavit. Perenni poena gehennam pariter cum ipso mancipabunt, quia utique qui facit peccatum servus est et filius zabuli nuncupatur. Quapropter resciat omnis homo timens Deum quod a me alieni sunt et a Christo Deo meo, pro quo legationem fungor, patricida, fratricida, lupi rapaces devorantes plebem Domini ut cibum panis, sicut ait: Iniqui dissipaverunt legem tuam, Domine, quam in supremis temporibus Hiberione optime benigne plantaverat atque instructa erat favente Deo. Non usurpo. Partem habeo cum his quos advocavit et praedestinavit evangelium praedicare in persecutionibus non parvis usque ad extremum terrae, etsi invidet inimicus per tyrannidem Corotici, qui Deum non veretur nec sacerdotes ipsius, quos elegit et indulsit illis summam divinam sublimam potestatem, quos ligarent super terram ligatos esse et in caelis. Unde ergo quaeso plurimum, sancti et humiles corde, adulari talibus non licet nec cibum nec potum sumere cum ipsis nec elemosinas ipsorum recipi debeat donec crudeliter per paenitentiam effusis lacrimis satis Deo faciant et liberent servos Dei et ancillas Christi baptizatas, pro quibus mortuus est et crucifixus. Sanctus Patricius Hibernorum Apostolus, Epistola Ad Coroticum Source: Migne PL 53.815a-c

With my own hand I have written and put together these words to be given and handed on and sent to the warriors of Coroticus. I cannot say that they are my fellow citizens, nor fellow citizens of the saints of Rome, but rather, because of their evil deeds, they are fellow citizens of demons. By their hostile ways they live in death, friends of the godless Scots and Picts. They are covered in blood, blood stained with the blood of innocent Christians, whose number I had given birth to in God and confirmed in Christ. The newly baptised and anointed were dressed in white robes, the anointing was still to be seen clearly on their foreheads, and they were cruelly slain and sacrificed by the sword of the ones I have referred to. On the day after that, I sent a letter by a holy priest whom I had taught from infancy, with clerics, to ask that they return to us some of the booty of the baptised prisoners they had captured. They laughed at them. So I don't know what I should lament the more, those who were slain, or those who were made captives, or those whom the devil has so gravely ensnared, who will be delivered up to the eternal pains of Gehenna equally along with the devil, because whoever commits sin is rightly called a slave and a son of the devil. 1 For this reason, let every man who fears God know that these people are foreign to me and to Christ my God, for whom I am an ambassador, they who are patricides and fratricides, savage wolves devouring the people of God, just as they would bread for food. 2 It is just as it is said: 'The wicked have routed your law, O Lord,' 3 the very law which in recent times He so graciously planted in Ireland and that has taken root with God's help. I am not overreaching in my office, I have a part with those whom God called and destined to preach the Gospel, even in persecutions that are no small matter, even to the ends of the earth, even amid the malice of the enemy through the tyranny of Coroticus, who respects neither God nor his priests, those whom God has chosen, granting to them the Divine and sublime power that whatever they should bind on earth will also be bound in heaven. 4 Therefore, before everything else, I ask all who are holy and humble of heart not to speak well of such men, nor even to share food or drink with them, nor accept alms from them, 5 until such time as they make satisfaction to God in severe penance and shedding of tears, and until they release the servants of God and the baptised handmaids of Christ, for whom He died and was crucified. Saint Patrick Apostle of the Irish, from The Letter to Coroticus 1 Jn 8.34-44 2 Ps 13.4 3 Ps 118.126 4 Mt 16.19 5 cf 2 Jn 10-11