Free religious clip art image. The Irish Catholic Saint Bridget, from a beautiful vintage engraving.

“The bright lamp that shone in Kildare’s holy fane,
And burned through long ages of darkness and storm.”

Although nearly every vestige of this saint is gone, she still lives as their patroness in the hearts of the Irish people. Her mother was very lovely, and the captive, taken in war, of a powerful chieftain. His wife, being jealous of her, turned her away before the birth of Bridget. But two disciples of St. Patrick took pity on them, and baptized the mother and child.

Bridget grew up with such beauty of mind and person, that she became famous, and her father desired to have her, and to marry her to a chief. But Bridget devoted herself to God’s service, especially to the instruction of women. She went to Kildare, “the cell or place of the oak,” and not only taught and preached, but performed miracles. Her fame drew about her many women who lived in huts, and from this arose the first religious community of women in Ireland. The convent and city of Kildare, were afterwards both flourishing and famous. Here was preserved unextinguished, for many centuries, the sacred lamp which burned before her altar.

Feast Day: February 1.

Adapted from A Handbook of Legendary and Mythological Art, by Clara Erskine Clement, 1871.