The Feast of Saint Andrew!

Today is the feast of St. Andrew, apostle, and martyr.

St. Andrew was St. Peter’s brother. St. Andrew actually heard of Jesus first and took his brother to meet him. What a wonderful example of the importance of Godly siblings in our lives and the positive influence they can have on us!

After Jesus ascended into heaven, the apostles scattered all over the known world to spread the Gospel message. Andrew went to Greece where he was eventually martyred. Andrew felt that he was unworthy to be crucified in the same manner as our Lord, so his cross was set up diagonally like a big X. This type of cross is called “St. Andrew’s Cross.” (Andrew’s brother Peter also felt unworthy to be baptized as Jesus was and was consequently crucified upside down.)

St. Andrew is to the Scottish what St. Patrick is to the Irish, although as far as we know, the saint never set a foot on the isle! There are two legends explaining this. The first is that St. Regulus had a dream that was to move the remains of St. Andrew to the far corners of the world for safe keeping. Apparently he only got as far as the eastern shore of Scotland before he shipwrecked, and the stop where he came ashore is today’s St. Andrew’s.

The other legend is that the Bishop of Hexham:

“who was a reknown collector of relics, brought the relics of St. Andrew to St. Andrews in 733. There certainly seems to have been a religious centre at St. Andrews at that time, either founded by St. Rule in the 6th century or by a Pictish King, Ungus, who reigned from 731 – 761.”

The Feast of St. Andrew sets the beginning of Advent! The first Sunday of Advent is always the Sunday closest to this feast day!

Our family has been reading Melissa Wiley’s The Martha Years BooksMartha Books for almost nine months now and these stories are set in Scotland. Young Martha, the laird’s daughter, is always helping in the kitchen with baking bannocks, or eating bannocks, so the kids and I have decided to actually make bannocks tomorrow in celebration of the feast day. I’ll post pictures and let you know if they turn out okay!

St. Andrew was the patron of fisherman (so a fish dinner to celebrate would certainly be appropriate!) and unmarried women. (There were a few neat traditions associated with that. Apparently if an unmarried woman throws her shoe at the door on St. Andrew’s day, if the toe points outward, the woman will be married and out of the house within a year! As luck would have it, I am also going to be the wedding coordinator for a wedding tomorrow, and I can’t wait to mention some of this to the bridal party!

For more links and info, see below!

St. Andrew Catholics Online.

Catholic Culture _St. Andrew

traditional bannocks recipes from scotland biscuits cakes and sweets

Baking for Britain Blog.

What are Bannocks?

Tea Time with Scones and Bannocks.

St. Andrew’s Connection to Scotland!

Some info on St. Andrew and some fun Scottish customs.