Luke Robert and Professor, since you have the same computer I'll address all of you together. First of all, I don't "believe everything" I read on the internet, but I find it reasonably credible when many sources relate coherently and the opposite points appear nowhere. (ie. none of the reading claims Patrick drove any snakes from Ireland). As for reading all the volumes of Bede (he left a long work on early church history in Briton for those still reading this topic, but not the only one) for some reason, I doubt you have enough mastery of Latin to have done so, either. Of course the board would like to know exactly where in Bede Patrick is described in the way quoted. (That is how debates are run, not by sending the other party on a blind search).

OK, so let's go to a serious and available source that relies on Bede as well as many other old sources. This one is a history manuscript hosted by Calvin College and you can see the sources listed at end of each chapter. (Before Chris hops in and tries to divert the topic to Calvinism, let me point out that should be irrelevant, as this hosted work is not about Reformation issues).
www.ccel.org/s/schaff/his....htm#_edn1

In the introduction, you don't have to scroll far to see:
Quote:
The mediaeval Christianization was a wholesale conversion, or a conversion of nations under the command of their leaders. It was carried on not only by missionaries and by spiritual means, but also by political influence, alliances of heathen princes with Christian wives, and in some cases (as the baptism of the Saxons under Charlemagne) by military force. It was a conversion not to the primary Christianity of inspired apostles, as laid down in the New Testament, but to the secondary Christianity of ecclesiastical tradition, as taught by the fathers, monks and popes.
Doesn't sound much like "history records that up to the sixth or seventh centuries, most Christians in Europe observed the seventh day sabbath". But okay, maybe there are conflicting sources. You didn't name any except Bede, but if you've got them, show them. Meanwhile I'll get back to Bede below.

First, if you continue on to the chapters on "The Conversion of England, Ireland, and Scotland," there is more detail on how the overall campaign took centuries and was often interrupted by wars and invasions, but there are references to three early bishops from Britain in the third century. At any rate with the conquest of the Anglo-Saxons, who were heathen barbarians, Christianity was nearly extinguished in Britain. Priests were cruelly massacred, churches and monasteries were destroyed, together with the vestiges of a weak Roman civilization. The weakness of the Britons prevented them from offering the gospel to the conquerors, who in turn would have rejected it from contempt of the conquered. This disastrous interruption may be what you are thinking of in saying Rome could "not make inroads" to the Irish, but as shown in quote below, the laspe didn't span the distance to 700-800. Notice the reference to the mission of our earlier mentioned friend Palladius in connection with his mission to the Irish sometime later, which from my earlier post sources, is said to have included Patrick:

Quote:
The Roman dominion in Britain ceased about A.D. 410; the troops were withdrawn, and the country left to govern itself. The result was a partial relapse into barbarism and a demoralization of the church. The intercourse with the Continent was cut off, and the barbarians of the North pressed heavily upon the Britons. For a century and a half we hear nothing of the British churches till the silence is broken by the querulous voice of Gildas, who informs us of the degeneracy of the clergy, the decay of religion, the introduction and suppression of the Pelagian heresy, and the mission of Palladius to the Scots in Ireland. This long isolation accounts in part for the trifling differences and the bitter antagonism between the remnant of the old British church and the new church imported from Rome among the hated Anglo-Saxons.


But fortunately Christianity was re-introduced from a remote country, and by persons who had nothing to do with the quarrels of the between various British factions. To Rome, aided by the influence of France, belongs the credit of reclaiming England to Christianity and civilization. In England the first, and, we may say, the only purely national church in the West was founded, but in close union with the papacy. By the end of the seventh century, the independent, insular, Teutonic church had become well established.

Im not trying to repeat the whole work at that site but one Bede reference really stands out. Lookie here: The conversion of King Lucius in the second century through correspondence with the Roman bishop Eleutherus (176 to 190), is related by Bede, in connection with several errors, and is a legend rather than an established fact. So BEDE does make errors, but notably, he tells of a conversion involving a Roman bishop in the SECOND century. That doesnt make Bede sound like he would be a lot of help proving Patrick or anybody else in the conversion of the isles was operating independently of Rome a few centuries later, but okay. Again, maybe this history only uses the Bede it finds supportive of its version of those centuries.

You by contrast have claimed he supports a messianic Patrick. OK, let's have chapter and verse. The lines are open.