Saul is in the heart of the countryside about 40 miles from Belfast, there are no shops, there are no fuel stations, there is just a church on a hill with views to the coast, the mountains and rolling hills.

Saul is the ‘cradle of Irish Christianity’. Some 1600 years ago St. Patrick, apostle and evangelist to the Irish made his first convert and established his first Christian community there. This is a great place to go and pray, it is peaceful, with a sense of the presence of God.

Patrick’s experience at the hands of Irish terrorists who brought him as a slave to Ireland did not deter him from returning. He was given a supernatural love for the Irish. He had become enslaved in a new way. Patrick comments, ‘…that after my misfortunes and so great difficulties, after my captivity, after the lapse of so many years, God should give me so great a grace on behalf of that nation, a thing in my youth, I never expected nor thought of.’ (St. Patrick’s Confession)

The call of Patrick back to Ireland can only be described as ‘Macedonian’,

‘And there I saw in the night the vision of a man, whose name was Victoricus, coming as it were from Ireland, with countless letters. And he gave me one of them, and I read the opening words of the letter, which were, `The voice of the Irish'; and as I read the beginning of the letter I thought that at the same moment I heard their voice---they were those beside the Wood of Voclut, which is near the Western Sea---and thus did they cry out as with one mouth: `We ask thee, boy, come and walk among us once more.' (St. Patrick’s Confession).

And I was quite broken in heart, and could read no further, and so I woke up. Thanks be to God, after many years the Lord gave to them according to their cry.’ (St. Patrick’s Confession).

The voice of the Irish is calling to you today, calling to all those who have a grace for this nation who live here and are scattered among the nations to pray!