The Stories Behind This Season:

The two stories offered here have special resonance with St. Brigit Episcopal Church and for our vision of our life together in the coming year.

Isaiah’s Tent

The prophet Isaiah, writing to the Israelites held in exile in Babylon (c. 550–450 BCE), envisions the unimaginable: release from exile and a return home to rebuild Jerusalem. In Chapter 54, he encourages the weary exiles to dare to dream. Using the image of a spacious tent, he calls on them to “enlarge the place of their tent” and “stretch their tent curtains wide” – to reach out, expand their influence, and make room to welcome new people into their community, strengthening their foundation to support their growth.

In 539 BCE, King Cyrus conquered the Babylonian Empire, and within a year issued a proclamation allowing the Jewish people to return to Judah and rebuild the temple in Jerusalem.

“Enlarge the Place of Your Tent,” by Patricia Adderley

"Enlarge the place of your tent."
Open wide the gates.
Stretch, challenge, Listen.
Holy Spirit come in.
Let's do this together.
One step toward you
And one step toward me.
Hand in hand we walk
Doing life together.
Steps of faith
Outside my comfort zone.
Flying on Eagles wings
As you lead me,
Stretch me,
Help me to grow -
Becoming all that you
Created me to be.
With you not for you.
Loving and praising you
With all my heart and all my mind.
May my life be a symphony
Of your glory
Working through me.

Source: Isaiah 54; “Enlarge the Place of Your Tent” by Patricia Adderley (www.patriciaadderley.com).

Brigit’s Mantle

The people of St. Brigit Episcopal Church walk in the footsteps of our namesake, St. Brigit of Kildare (c. 451–525 CE), who threw her cloak on the ground and watched it grow to encompass all the countryside.

The story is told that Brigit asked for a small piece of land to build a monastery on the Curragh plain — a site near a lake in a forest, offering firewood and water, close to a fertile plain suitable for farming. When the King of Leinster heard her request, he refused. Brigit prayed, then asked the king for only as much land as her small cloak could cover. Laughing, he agreed.

Brigit asked her four companions to each take a corner of her cloak – her mantle – and walk away in the four directions: north, south, east, and west. Miraculously, as they walked, the mantle grew to spread across acres of land.

Amazed at this evidence of Brigit’s partnership with the divine, the king conceded the land, became a patron of her monastery, and later converted to Christianity.

Brigit became known as Brigit of the Mantle, and the mantle – bridging earth and the sacred – came to represent God’s abundance and grace, spiritual protection and sanctuary, and the miraculous subversion of limits no one thought could move.

From “Legend of St. Brigid’s Cloak,“ https://brigidine.org.au/about-us/our-patroness/legend-of-st-brigids-cloak/  © 2026 Copyright. Brigidine Sisters. Used by permission.