Early Middle Ages

Who Was St. Augustine of Canterbury? The Apostle of the English

St. Augustine of Canterbury (died 604) was the Roman monk who led the Gregorian mission to Kent in 597 and became the first Archbishop of Canterbury.

Question & answer

St. Augustine of Canterbury (died 604) was the Roman monk who led the mission sent by Pope Gregory the Great to convert the Anglo-Saxons in 596, and he became the first Archbishop of Canterbury. The mission he led established Christianity as the official religion of the kingdom of Kent, laid the foundations of the English church, and set the pattern for the conversion of the rest of England. Augustine is venerated as a saint in both the Roman Catholic and Anglican traditions, and he is often called the “Apostle of the English.”

The Gregorian mission

Augustine was a monk of the monastery of St. Andrew in Rome, where he served as prior under Pope Gregory the Great. According to the historian Bede, Gregory had been struck by the appearance of fair-haired Anglo-Saxon slaves in a Roman market, and he had been moved to attempt their conversion. The story may be apocryphal, but it captures the pope’s sense of mission. Gregory selected Augustine to lead the mission, and he provided him with a small group of companions, instructions on how to adapt the Roman liturgy to the English church, and letters of introduction to the Frankish kings through whose territory they would pass.

The mission left Rome in 596, but it almost failed before it began. The missionaries were so discouraged by the journey through Frankish territory that they turned back, and Augustine had to be sent back to encourage them to continue. The mission eventually landed in the kingdom of Kent in 597, where King Æthelberht had a Christian Frankish wife, Bertha, and where a small Christian community had been maintained since her arrival. Æthelberht was persuaded to accept baptism, and he allowed the missionaries to establish their base in Canterbury, his capital.

The conversion of Kent

The conversion of Kent was remarkably rapid. Within a few months of Augustine’s arrival, King Æthelberht had been baptized, and the Christmas Day baptism of ten thousand of his subjects is recorded in the early sources. Augustine was consecrated as the first Archbishop of Canterbury, and he established bishoprics at Rochester and London. The new English church was organized on the Roman model, with a metropolitan see at Canterbury and suffragan sees in the major cities of the kingdom.

Augustine’s strategy was to work through the existing political structure, converting the king and then supporting the establishment of bishoprics and monasteries in his kingdom. The missionaries were monks, sent by the pope, who traveled with the protection of the king and the support of his court. They were also given property and other forms of support by the king, and they were allowed to use the existing Roman buildings in Canterbury as their base. The strategy was successful: by the time of Augustine’s death in 604, Christianity had been established in Kent, and it was beginning to spread to the neighboring kingdoms of Essex and East Anglia.

Augustine and the British church

One of Augustine’s most difficult challenges was his relationship with the native British church. The British church had been Christian since the Roman period, but it had been weakened by the Anglo-Saxon invasions, and it had retreated to the western parts of Britain. Augustine attempted to bring the British bishops into his mission, but the meetings that he held with them were unsuccessful. According to Bede, the British bishops refused to accept Augustine’s authority, and they declined to cooperate with his mission.

The most famous meeting took place at Augustine’s Oak, on the border between the English and British territories. The British bishops were accompanied by a hermit who advised them to test Augustine’s authority by seeing whether he rose to greet them. When Augustine remained seated, the British took this as a sign that he lacked the humility of a true apostle, and they refused to cooperate with his mission. The story may be legendary, but it captures the real tension between the Roman and British traditions.

Despite his failure to unite the British and English churches, Augustine’s mission was a major success. It established Christianity as the official religion of the most powerful kingdom in southern England, it created the framework of the English church, and it set the pattern for the conversion of the rest of England. The archbishopric of Canterbury, which Augustine founded, has remained the senior see of the English church to this day.

Augustine’s legacy

Augustine died on May 26, 604, and was buried at the Abbey of St. Augustine, outside the walls of Canterbury. He was soon venerated as a saint, and his cult became one of the most important in medieval England. The Archbishop of Canterbury remained the senior prelate of the English church, and the archbishopric of Canterbury remained the metropolitan see of the southern province of the English church.

Augustine’s mission also had consequences for the wider church. It was a model for the conversion of the rest of England, and it was supported by a series of papal letters and privileges that established the pope’s authority over the English church. The success of the mission also encouraged Gregory the Great to send further missions to the continent, and the pattern set by Augustine - working through kings, founding monasteries, and developing indigenous clergy - became the standard for Western missionary activity for centuries.

Augustine is best known today through the account of his mission in Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of the English People, written in 731. Bede’s account, although written more than a century after the events, is the principal source for the mission, and it has shaped the way that the conversion of England has been understood ever since. Augustine’s image, with his monks landing in Kent and preaching to the king, has become the iconic representation of the Christianization of England.