As Mentioned in Episode 56 – Death by Crossover

But why would a Scots Presbytarian think of a pre-Christian Irish goddess? Or even, if we’re talking saint over god, Brigid of Ireland? Scotland isn’t Ireland. Whilst there is overlap, Finan and whatnot, you’re conflating Irish and Scottish culture and history.

I always saw it as St. Margaret of Scotland [but then the artist mixed up our St. Margaret with any of the many, many other St. Magarets.

As mentioned in the podcast, Rahne is Scots Presbyterian, who don’t “do saints and angels”. Except that Scots Presbyterians, and I’m speaking from experience here, not just from Dr. Internet or asking twitter, do do saints. Heh. In a way, at least.

First, I want to address the “don’t do angels” part. That’s not true. You’re not supposed to worship angels as you would god, but to say Scots Presbyterians don’t do them at all is false. The monument to Margaret Wilson, her faith unto death celebrated as part of the martyrology of Presbyterian churches, depicts Margaret Wilson reading the Bible with her young sister, watched over by an angel. Angels do exist in Scots Presbyterian beliefs, you just don’t/can’t worship them. They are not entirely absent.

As for saints, I mean, I say this as literally someone who spent too much time at a presbyterian church named for St. Margaret. Where the church “Earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints”. If we/they didn’t “do” saints, then why would we/they be looking for the faith delivered to them? Songs are about those people who became saints, including songs referring to a queen. This being Margaret.

Margaret was initially an exile, and was renowned for her devout piety and religious observance. She was the epitome of faith in action. Pious and caring to the point where this contributed to ill health, as she often didn’t eat or sleep as it would get in the way of helping the poor. There’s a lot of things that might apply, but we’d be here all day, so I’ll end with the fact Margaret damn well did her best to rid the church of its bad and corrupt practices. People like her father. Feels like it’d fit with Rahne.

Why St. Margaret as a sign for death? She’s the patron saint of the death of children.

So that’s who I always imagined it to be. And then back in the day, confusion as to which was which lead to the different appearance. I mean, we literally have two Saint Margarets of British countries [of Scotland, and of England] who were both born in Hungary. and THEN there’s a Saint Margaret of Hungary.

A long ramble, and years too late, but I just listened to this episode and thought I would offer a different perspective.