There are souvenir buttons, banners and greeting cards with shamrocks, harps and leprechauns that boldly declare everybody’s Irish on St. Patrick’s Day. But are they?

Proof exists that it’s almost true.

There are 30.1 million Americans whose DNA bleeds green!

Claiming everyone is a brief flirtation with global Celtification, the power of commercialism and the magic of the popular myth that little people exit. Everybody favors their own clan but the Irish apparently have the biggest tribal diaspora from the smallest population. Now are we the cultural imperialists?

I’m guilty myself of forcing jigs and reels on my Jewish husband.

In Ireland almost everyone is still Irish including a diverse population unimaginable until a few years ago when Ireland opened its doors to the first generation of Nigerians, later welcoming the Poles, Ukrainians, Brazilians UK citizens, Australians, Americans and Europeans from East to West — the future Irish. Almost 20% of the population living in Ireland today was born elsewhere. One of them checked us in when we were boarding the plane home on my last visit. I was thrilled to hear a full on Irish accent emerging from a beautiful Black woman. She was 23 and told us she lived in Kildare, a quare aul commute to Dublin Airport. She reminded me of my new friend Elvis, my go to cab ride to the Abbey Theatre. He volunteered to come back and pick me up after the play. “This is a rough part of Dublin at night,” he said and “you’re on your own missus, I’ll come back for ya.” I asked him about his Irish odyssey.

How did you get here? How long ago?

He said he came from Ghana about 23 years ago and lives in Rialto and that his wife is Irish. He added his Irish African children were champion Irish dancers. I love to put this spin on Irish diversity and cultural identity and how it’s being absorbed by the new generation of non natives. As time has gone on it’s not surprising some newcomers have had to cope with the otherizing we frequently see in the U.S.

Why are we doing so much for immigrants? Why?

They of course, are doing so much for us, is the level-headed answer, I was thrilled to hear over and over. There are the naysayers but Ireland’s treatment of its immigrants is a far cry from ICE rampaging the streets. The recent horrors in Minneapolis a reminder to myself of my own illegal status when I first came here. Part of a trio The Burren Flora in 1972, recruited by Tommy Makem to perform at The Harp and Bard in Norwood. There was some vague reference to the fact that we’d be given Social Security numbers and we’d be “grand” and I suppose we were until we weren’t and had to deal with illegal immigration issues. My status changed to legal through marriage.

More recently as affordable housing contracts and many young working professionals are priced out, the influx of refugees receiving benefits and preferential treatment is a source of tension. In 2024 the only hotel in Roscrea, Racket Hall, was completely shut down to house 160 refugee Ukrainians.

The owner received more than two million Euros from the Irish government. For two years the owner didn’t have to worry about filling beds because the hotel couldn’t take any other business, no weddings, meetings, restaurants or passing tourists. There was outrage, protesters voicing their anger that other businesses in the town were also adversely impacted.

For the most part there is acknowledged gratitude to immigrants for how much they have contributed to the successful Irish economy. They fill a multitude of service jobs. We couldn’t get on without them, I’ve heard it said. On the way back from the Abbey to The Mespil Hotel I couldn’t wait to hear Elvis’s story and indeed there he was outside The Abbey when I emerged from the play. I didn’t have to be convinced of his importance in the new Ireland, he was going above and beyond, waiting for me, doing his job, with no suggestion of resentment being asked questions by an old white lady, he already had “the craic” on the tip of his tongue like any native born cabbie. Recently, an impassioned speech was given in the Dáil (Irish Parliament) by Aodhán O Ríordán, making a plea to the Taoiseach (prime minister) Michael Martin to decline the traditional St. Patrick’s Day invitation to the White House. He has accepted it for obvious reasons. A significant amount of Ireland’s prosperity hinges on the many American companies doing business there.

St. Patrick’s Day in my youth was distinguished by being a Holy Day of obligation, a reminder that Patrick, a slave, converted the Irish to Christianity, using the shamrock as a visual symbol of the Trinity, three Gods in one. I don’t remember any parades. Would you really be cast into hell’s fire if you missed going to Mass on the feast of the Holy Saint?

Those were the questions that loomed over an Irish childhood. In my growing up years, 97% of the population would have gone to Mass on St. Patrick’s Day, maybe prompted by fear of damnation, or the more frivolous reason for attendance, to see and be seen. Certain family’s females used the occasion to strut their feathered hats and fashion furbelows. In today’s Ireland a fraction of those numbers show up at Mass with shamrock badges and green outfits, the de rigueur St. Patrick’s day Mass costume of my youth, now a thing of the past, more likely to be seen in western Massachusetts at The Saint Patrick’s Day Parade in Holyoke.

Rosemary Caine, a dual citizen of Ireland and the U.S., is a harp player, songwriter and lives in Greenfield.