Saint Boniface

Bishop and Martyr, Apostle of Germany
(672–754)

Saint Boniface, the Apostle of Germany, was born in Devonshire, England, around the year 672, and received the name Winfrid. Educated from childhood by the Benedictine monks of Exeter and Nursling, he displayed from his earliest years an ardent zeal for learning and for souls. He became a monk and then a priest, and his gifts as a teacher and preacher were widely recognized.

Against his community's wishes, Winfrid felt an irresistible call to evangelize the pagan Germanic peoples on the continent. After a first unsuccessful attempt in Frisia, he went to Rome, where Pope Gregory II received him warmly, gave him the name Boniface, and commissioned him as a missionary bishop for Germany. Armed with papal authority, he laboured for decades in Hesse, Thuringia, Bavaria, and Frisia, baptizing thousands, establishing dioceses, founding monasteries, and reforming the Frankish Church with the support of Charles Martel and Pepin III.

His most celebrated act was the felling of the sacred oak of Donar at Geismar in Hesse, a tree venerated by the pagans. When no divine retribution followed, hundreds accepted baptism. He founded the great monastery of Fulda, which became the center of German Catholicism. Created archbishop of Mainz, he served as the principal organizer of the Church in Germany and Gaul.

In old age he resigned his see to return to the mission fields of Frisia. On June 5, 754, as he prepared to administer Confirmation at a gathering near Dokkum, he and his companions were set upon by a band of pagan warriors and put to the sword. He died with the scriptures pressed to his chest. He is venerated as the patron saint of Germany.