BRIEF BIOGRAPHY OF ST. BONIFACE
SAINT BONIFACE MARTYR, APOSTLE OF GERMANY—680754 A.D.
Feast: June 5
Isolated missionary groups had penetrated central Germany
in earlier times, but not until the eighth century was there a
systematic effort to Christianize the vast pagan wilderness. To
the English monk Boniface belongs the honor of opening up
this region and creating a hierarchy under direct commission
from the Holy See. Thirty-six years of missionary labor under
difficult and dangerous conditions, ending at last in martyrdom, entitle this good and
courageous man to the designation, "Apostle of Germany."
Boniface, or Winfrid, to give him his baptismal name, was born into a Christian family of
noble rank, probably at Crediton in Devonshire, about the year 680. The reorganized
English Church, still under the inspiration brought to it from Rome two generations earlier
by Augustine of Canterbury, was full of fervor and vitality. Winfrid was a very small boy
when he found himself listening to the conversation of some monks who were visiting his
home. He resolved then to enter the Church, and this resolution never weakened. Winfrid's
father had other plans for his clever son, but a serious illness altered his attitude, and he
sent the boy to the neighboring abbey of Exeter to be educated. Some years later, Winfrid
went to the abbey of Bursling, in the diocese of Winchester. After completing his studies
there, he was appointed head of the school.
His teaching skill attracted many students, and for their use he wrote a grammar which is
still extant. The pupils diligently took notes at his classes, and these were copied and
circulated in other monasteries, where they were eagerly studied. At the age of thirty he
was ordained priest, and now added preaching to teaching and administrative work.
Winfrid was assured of rapid advancement in the English Church, but God revealed to him
that his work was to be in foreign lands, where need was greater. Northern Europe and
most of Central Europe were still in pagan darkness. In Friesland, which then included
modern Netherlands and lands to the east, the Northumbrian missionary Willibrord had
long been striving to bring the Gospel to the people. It was to this region that Winfrid felt
himself called. Having obtained the consent of his abbot, he and two companions set out in
the spring of 716. Soon after landing at Doerstadt they learned that Duke Radbold of
Friesland, an enemy of Christianity, was warring with Charles Martel, the Frankish duke,
and that Willibrord had been obliged to retire to his monastery at Echternacht. Realizing
that the time was inauspicious, the missionaries prudently returned to England in the
autumn. Winfrid's monks at Bursling tried to keep him there, and wished to elect him
abbot, but he was not to be turned from his purpose.
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This first attempt had shown him that to be effective as a missionary he must have a direct
commission from the Pope, so in 718, with commendatory letters from the bishop of
Winchester, he presented himself in Rome before Gregory II. The Pope welcomed him
warmly, kept him in Rome until spring of the following year, when traveling conditions
were favorable, and then sent him forth with a general commission to preach the word of
God to the heathen. At this time Winfrid's name was changed to Boniface (from the Latin,
<bonifatus>, fortunate). Crossing the lower Alps, the missionary traveled through Bavaria
into Hesse. Duke Radbold had died and his successor was more friendly. Going into
Friesland, Boniface labored for three years under Willibrord, who was now very old.
Boniface declined to become Willibrord's coadjutor and successor as bishop of Utrecht,
saying that his commission had been general, "to the heathen," and he could not be limited
to any one diocese. He now returned to work in Hesse.
Boniface had little difficulty in making himself understood as a preacher, since the dialects
of the various Teutonic tribes closely resembled his native Anglo-Saxon. He won the
interest of two powerful local chieftains, Dettic and Deorulf, who at some previous time had
been baptized. For lack of instruction they had remained little better than pagans; now they
became zealous Christians and influenced many others to be baptized. They also gave
Boniface a grant of land on which he later founded the monastery of Amoeneburg. Boniface
was able to report such remarkable gains that the Pope summoned him back to Rome to be
ordained bishop.
In Rome on St. Andrew's Day, November 30, 722, Pope Gregory II consecrated him as
regionary bishop with a general jurisdiction over "the races in the parts of Germany and
east of the Rhine who live in error, in the shadow of death." The Pope also gave him a letter
to the powerful Charles Martel, "The Hammer." When Boniface delivered it to the Frankish
duke on his way back to Germany, he received the valuable gift of a sealed pledge of
Frankish protection. Armed thus with authority from both the Church and the civil power,
the prestige of Boniface was vastly enhanced. On his return to Hesse, he decided to try to
root out the pagan superstitions which seriously affected the stability of his converts. On a
day publicly announced, and in the midst of an awe-struck crowd, Boniface and one or two
of his followers attacked with axes Thor's sacred oak. These German tribes, along with
many other primitive peoples, were tree-worshipers. Thor, god of thunder, was one of the
principal Teutonic deities, and this ancient oak, which stood on the summit of Mt.
Gudenberg, was sacred to him. After a few blows, the huge tree crashed to earth, splitting
into four parts. The terrified tribesmen, who had expected a punishment to fall instantly on
the perpetrators of such an outrage, now saw that their god was powerless to protect even
his own sanctuary.
To signalize the victory, Boniface built a chapel on the spot. From that time the work of
evangelization in Hesse proceeded steadily.
Moving east into Thuringia, Boniface continued his crusade. He found a few undisciplined
Celtic and Irish priests, who tended to be a hindrance; many of them held heretical beliefs
and others lived immoral lives. Boniface restored order among them, although his chief aim
was to win over the pagan tribes. At Ohrdruff, near Gotha, he established a second
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monastery, dedicated to St. Michael, as a missionary center. Everywhere the people were
ready to listen, but there was a critical lack of teachers. Boniface appealed to the English
monasteries and convents, and their response was so wholehearted that for several years
bands of monks, schoolmasters, and nuns came over to place themselves under his
direction. The two monasteries already built were enlarged and new ones founded. Among
the new English missionaries were Lullus, who was to succeed Boniface at Mainz, Eoban,
who was to share his martyrdom, Burchard, and Wigbert; the nuns included Thecla,
Chunitrude, and Boniface's beautiful and learned young cousin, Lioba, later to become
abbess of Bischofsheim and friend of Hildegarde, Charlemagne's wife.
Pope Gregory III sent Boniface the pallium in 731, appointing him archbishop and
metropolitan of all Germany beyond the Rhine, with authority to found new bishoprics. A
few years later Boniface made his third trip to Rome to confer about the churches he had
founded, and at this time he was appointed apostolic legate. Stopping at Monte Cassino, he
enlisted more missionaries. In his capacity as legate he traveled into Bavaria to organize
the Church there into the four bishoprics of Regensburg, Freising, Salzburg, and Passau.
From Bavaria he returned to his own field and founded new bishoprics at Erfurt for
Thuringia, Buraburg for Hesse, Wurzburg for Franconia, and Eichstadt for the Nordgau. An
English monk was placed at the head of each new diocese. In 741 the great Benedictine
abbey at Fulda was founded in Prussia to serve as the fountainhead of German monastic
culture. Its first abbot was Boniface's young Bavarian disciple, Sturm or Sturmio. In the
early Middle Ages Fulda produced a host of scholars and teachers, and became known as
the Monte Cassino of Germany.
While the evangelization of Germany was proceeding steadily, the Church in Gaul, under
the Merovingian kings, was disintegrating. High ecclesiastical offices were either kept
vacant, sold to the highest bidder, or bestowed on unworthy favorites. Pluralism, the
holding by one man of many offices, each of which should demand his full time, was
common. The great mass of the clergy was ignorant and undisciplined. No synod or church
council had been held for eighty-four years. Charles Martel had been conquering and
consolidating the regions of western Europe, and now regarded himself as an ally of the
papacy and the chief champion of the Church, yet he had persistently plundered it to obtain
funds for his wars and did nothing to help the work of reform. His death, however, in 74I,
and the accession of his sons, Carloman and Pepin the Short, provided an opportunity
which Boniface quickly seized. Carloman, the elder, was very devout and held Boniface in
great veneration; Boniface had no trouble in persuading him to call a synod to deal with
errors and abuses in the Church in Austrasia, Alemannia, and Thuringia.
The first assembly was followed by several others. Boniface presided over them all, and
was able to carry through many important reforms. The vacant bishoprics and parishes
were filled, discipline reestablished, and fresh vigor infused into the Frankish Church.
A heretic who had been creating much disturbance, one Adalbert of Neustria, was
condemned by the synod of Soissons in 744. In 747 another general council of the Frankish
clergy drew up a profession of faith and fidelity which was sent to Rome and laid upon the
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altar in the crypt of St. Peter's. After five years' labor Boniface had succeeded in restoring
the Church of Gaul to its former greatness.
Now Boniface desired that Britain too should share in this reform movement. At his request
and that of Pope Zacharias, the archbishop of Canterbury held a council at Clovesho, in 747,
which adopted many of the resolutions passed in Gaul. This was also the year when
Boniface was given a metropolitan see. Cologne was at first proposed as his cathedral city,
but Mainz was finally chosen. Even when Cologne and other cities became archiepiscopal
sees, Mainz retained the primacy. The Pope also made Boniface primate of Germany as well
as apostolic legate for both Germany and Gaul.
Carloman now retired to a monastery, but his successor, Pepin, who brought all Gaul under
his control, gave Boniface his support. "Without the patronage of the Frankish chiefs,"
Boniface wrote in a letter to England, "I cannot govern the people or exercise discipline
over the clergy and monks, or check the practice of paganism." As apostolic legate, Boniface
crowned Pepin at Soissons in 75I, thus giving papal sanction to the assumption of royal
power by the father of Charlemagne. Boniface, beginning to feel the weight of his years,
made Lullus his coadjutor. Yet even now, when he was past seventy, his missionary zeal
burned ardently. He wished to spend his last years laboring among those first converts in
Friesland, who, since Willibrord's death, were relapsing once more into paganism. Leaving
all things in order for Lullus, who was to become his successor, he embarked with some
fifty companions and sailed down the Rhine. At Utrecht the party was joined by Eoban,
bishop of that diocese. They set to work reclaiming the relapsed Christians, and during the
following months made fruitful contact with the hitherto untouched tribes to the northeast.
Boniface arranged to hold a great confirmation service on Whitsun Eve on the plain of
Dokkum, near the banks of the little river Borne.
While awaiting the arrival of the converts, Boniface was quietly reading in his tent.
Suddenly a band of armed pagans appeared in the center of the encampment. His
companions would have tried to defend their leader, but Boniface would not allow them to
do so. Even as he was telling them to trust in God and welcome the prospect of dying for
Him, the Germans attacked. Boniface was one of the first to fall; his companions shared his
fate. The pagans, expecting to carry away rich booty, were disgusted when they found,
besides provisions, only a box of holy relics and a few books They did not bother to carry
away these objects, which were later collected by the Christians who came to avenge the
martyrs and rescue their remains. The body of Boniface was carried to Fulda for burial, and
there it still rests. The book the bishop was reading and which he is said to have lifted
above his head to save it when the blow fell is also one of Fulda's treasures.
Boniface has been called the pro-consul of the papacy. His administrative and organizing
genius left its mark on the German Church throughout the Middle Ages.
Though Boniface was primarily a man of action, his literary remains are extensive.
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Especially interesting and important from the point of view of Church dogma and history
are his letters. Among the emblems of Boniface are an oak, an axe, a sword, a book.
A FEW OF THE LETTERS WRITTEN BY ST. BONIFACE
Wynfrith (St. Boniface) encourages the youth Nithard in the pursuit of virtue and of
his literary studies. 716-717
To Nithard, dear companion and beloved friend, whom neither a perishable gift of worldly
wealth nor the pleasing charm and blandishments of flattering words won to me, but whom
the splendid affinity and kinship of the spirit recently linked with me by an imperishable
chain of love, Wynfrith, a suppliant, greetings of eternal welfare in Jesus Christ.
From my humble place I pray, noble youth and dear brother, that thou mayst not fail to
recall the words of Solomon the wise: “In all thy works remember thy last end: and thou
shalt never sin,”1 and elsewhere: “Walk while ye have the light, lest the darkness of death
come upon ye,”2 because the things of the present will quickly pass, but those that abide
for ever will soon be at hand. All the treasures of this world, whether in gleaming gold and
silver, or in starlike gems, or in the strange 43 diversity of sumptuous food and costly
garments, by a just comparison pass like shadows, disappear like smoke, vanish like foam,
for the psalmist truly says: “As for man, his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so he
flourisheth,”3 and elsewhere: “My days are like a shadow that declineth: and I am withered
like grass.”4
Wealth-loving sybarites are known from Holy Scripture, to keep in misery a fruitless
watch,5 to spin vainly fragile spider-webs which catch a light breeze or dust, since,
according to the psalmist, they heap up riches and know not for whom they gather them.
And when death the agent of the hated Pluto, grinding his bloody teeth lurks at the
threshold, terror-stricken and deprived of all heavenly aid they suddenly lose their
precious and false wealth, which night and day they greedily and anxiously saved, and with
it lose their souls. Then, caught away by fiendish hands, they enter the awful gates of
Erebus to pay an eternal penalty.
Since all these things are true beyond a scruple of a doubt, I implore thee with the most
earnest prayers which 44 my love can suggest, that having considered their truth thou wilt
hasten to revive the grace of natural ability which is in thee, and wilt not extinguish in the
mire and dust of earthly desires the knowledge of the liberal arts and the bright spiritual
fire of divine understanding; but that, mindful of what the psalmist says of the happy man:
“But his delight is in the law of the Lord: and in His law doth he meditate day and night,”6
and elsewhere: “O how love I Thy law! it is my meditation all the day,”7 and of what is said
in Deuteronomy concerning the law of Moses: “This book of the law shall not depart out of
thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night,”8 thou wilt put aside the harmful
obstacles of other things, and wilt strive to pursue the study of the Holy Scriptures with all
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the bent of thy mind, and thereby to acquire that truly noble and splendid grace which is
divine wisdom. For it is more splendid than gold, brighter than silver, more resplendent
than the carbuncle, clearer than crystal, richer than topaz, and on the authority of him who
speaks wisdom, all precious things are not to be compared with it. What, beloved brother,
can youth more properly seek or age more soberly enjoy than the knowledge of the Holy
Scriptures? Guiding the ship of our soul it will bring it, without shipwreck in the 45
dangerous storm, to the beautiful shore of paradise and the eternal joy of the angels in
heaven. Of it the same wise man has said: “Wisdom overcometh evil. She reacheth therefore
from end to end mightily, and ordereth all things sweetly. Her have I loved and have sought
her out from my youth, and have desired to take her for my spouse: and I became a lover of
her beauty. She glorifieth her nobility by being versant with God: yea, the Lord of all things
hath loved her. For it is she that teacheth the knowledge of God.”9
Wherefore, if the Omnipotent God wills that returning, as I purpose to do, I should reach
those parts,10 I promise to be thy faithful friend to all things and in the study of the Holy
Scriptures, so far as my strength allows, thy devoted assistant.
Fare well, my brother, in youth’s flower and strength,
Mayst flourish with the Lord in His eternal home,
Where martyrs hymn the King in heavenly choirs,
And prophets and apostles add their meed of praise,
Where, for eternity, the King of Kings His subjects dowers,
There mayst thou bear the form of cherubin and seraphin,
To the apostles heir, of prophets son.
46 Nithard, avoid the dark contagion of this lowly earth,
In punishment of Hell will it involve thee,
The choirs above the heaven’s blue seek to discover,
Hosts singing to the God of Truth eternally,
Angelic canticles; there in the highest place
Resplendent stand; the golden prize of Heaven’s court
Draw down upon thy gleaming brows, and with thy praise
Hymn Christ on His celestial throne.
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Boniface Writes to the English, Asking Prayers for the Conversion of the Saxons
To all his most reverend colleagues in the episcopate, to the venerable priests, deacons,
canons, clerics, abbots and abbesses of communities, to the lowly monks who obey for
Christ's sake, to the consecrated and devout virgins and all professed nuns of Christ, indeed
to all those Catholics of the English race who fear God, Boniface, a native of the same race,
legate of the Universal Church in Germany and servant of the Apostolic See, formerly called
Wynfrith, but now, through no deserts of his own, archbishop: greetings in the humble
communion and sincere love of Christ.
With humble prayer, we beseech you, brethren, of your charity to remember our lowly
selves in your prayers, that we may escape the cunning snares of the devil and the
buffetings of evil men, that the word of the Lord may prosper and be glorified. We beg you
to be instant in prayer that God and our Lord Jesus Christ, who desires all men to be saved
and to come to the knowledge of the truth, may convert the hearts of the pagan Saxons to
the faith, may make them repent of the devilish errors in which they are entangled and
unite them to the children of Mother Church. Have pity on them, because their repeated cry
is: " We are of one and the same blood and bone." Remember that we go the way of all flesh
and in hell no man praises the Lord nor can death honour Him.
Be it known that in this undertaking I have the agreement and support and blessing of two
Pontiffs of the Roman See. Act, then, on this prayer of mine, that your reward among the
angels of heaven may be manifest and enlarged.
May the Almighty Creator keep your unity and common bond of love in force for evermore.
Boniface Asks Protection for His Mission In Thuringia From Grifo, Mayor of The
Palace
Grffo was step-brother to Pippin the Short and Carloman, being the son of Charles Martel and
the Bavarian Sonnichilde. When this letter was written Charles Martel had just died and the
struggles between the brothers for power had not yet begun. Grifo was eventually eliminated
and Pippin and Carloman gained complete control.
Boniface, servant of the servants of God, greetings in Christ to Grifo, son of Charles.
I beg and entreat Your Highness in the name of God the Father Almighty, of Jesus Christ, His
Son, and of the Holy Ghost, by the Trinity and Unity of God, that in the event of your coming
to power you will help the clerics, priests, monks, nuns and all the servants of God in
Thuringia, and that you will protect the Christians from the hostility of the heathens so that
they may not be destroyed by them. Thus you will reap an everlasting reward at the
judgment seat of Christ. Be assured that you are constantly in our prayers to God: this, your
father desired during his lifetime as did also your mother. We pray God, the Saviour of the
world, to guide your steps through life, so that your soul may be saved and you may abide
in the grace of God for evermore.
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Meanwhile, my son, recall the words of the psalmist: "Man's life is like the grass, he blooms
and dies like a flower in the fields." And the Apostle: "The whole world about us was in the
power of evil." And Truth Himself says in the Gospel: "How is a man the better for gaining
the whole world if he loses himself?. "And again in the Gospel, speaking of the glory of the
just: "Then, at last, the just will shine out, clear as the sun, in their Father's kingdom." And
Paul, the Apostle, said about the bliss of eternal life: "Things no eye has seen, nor ear heard,
no human heart conceived, is the welcome God has prepared for those who love Him.
So conduct yourself my son, that your reward may shine ever more brightly in the high
vault of heaven.
Our wish is that it may be well with you till the end of your days in Christ.
St. Boniface the Apostle to the Germans ca. 680-755
Letter XIII, To the Holy Virgin and Dear Lady Eadburga
I thank God that now I can the more fully meet thy wishes, because but lately I spoke with
this brother myself, when he came back here from abroad; he set forth to me in his own
words the marvellous spectacle which he beheld when rapt in spirit beyond the body… As
he quitted the body, angels of such dazzling brightness that he could scarcely look upon
them for their splendour, bore him up. With sweet and harmonious voices they were
singing, “O Lord, rebuke me not in Thy wrath: neither chasten me in Thy hot displeasure.”
“They raised me,” said he, “high into the air, and circling the world I beheld a blazing fire,
the mighty flame soaring terribly aloft, as though to grasp the whole mechanism of the
world in its embrace, had not the holy angel calmed it with the sign of Christ’s holy cross.
When he had made the sign of the cross before the threatening flame, it gradually retired.
By its terrible heat I was sorely tried, while my eyes were burned, and my sight was
shattered by the brightness of the gleaming spirits until an angel, splendid to behold,
touched my head with a protecting hand, and brought me safe from harm in the flames.
He added that during the time while he was out of the body, such a multitude of souls
leaving the body had gathered where he was as to exceed what he had thought before to be
the numbers of the whole human race. An innumerable band of evil spirits and a bright
choir of heavenly angles had also assembled; and there was the greatest dispute between
the demons and the angels over the souls leaving the body, for the demons were accusing
the dead and making heavy the burden of their sins, while the angels were excusing them
and lightening their load.
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Boniface Thanks Abbess Eadburga for Sending Him Books
To his dear sister, Abbess Eadburga, long united to him by spiritual ties, Boniface, a servant
of the servants of God, greetings in Christ without end.
May the Eternal Rewarder of good works give joy on high among the choirs of angels to my
dearest sister, who has brought light and consolation to an exile in Germany by sending
him gifts of spiritual books. For no man can shed light on these gloomy lurking-places of the
German people and take heed of the snares that beset his path unless he have the Word of
God as a lamp to guide his feet and a light to shine on his way.
Of your charity I earnestly beg you to pray for me, because as a penalty for my sins I am
tossed about by the storms of this dangerous sea, begging God, who is high above us but
stoops to regard the lowly, to give me words to speak my mind boldly that the Word of the
Lord may run its triumphant course and the Gospel of Christ may be glorified among the
heathen.
To his friend in the embrace of loving arms, his brother in the bonds of spiritual
brotherhood, Archbishop Egbert clothed with the garment of supreme prelacy, abundant
greeting of unfailing love in Christ from Boniface, humble bishop, legate in Germany of the
Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church
We have received with joyful and grateful heart the gifts and books you sent us...
Meantime we greatly need your advice and counsel. When I find a priest who long since fell
into carnal sin and after doing penance was restored to his office by the Franks, and now
dwells in a large district with no other priests and is administering baptism and celebrating
Mass for a population who are believers but are prone to error- if now I withdraw him,
according to the most approved canons, then, because of the scarcity of priests, infants will
die without the sacred water of birth, unless I have some better man to replace him. Judge
therefore between me and the erring people, whether it is better, or at least the lesser evil,
that such a man should perform the service of the sacred altar or that the mass of the
people should die as pagans because they have no way of securing a better minister.
Or when in the multitude of priests, I find one who has fallen into that same sin and with
penitence has been reinstated in his former rank, so that the whole body of priests and
people have confidence in his good character, if I should now degrade him, his secret sin
would be revealed, the mass of the people would be shocked, many souls would be lost
through the scandal and there would be great hatred of priests and distrust of the ministers
of the Church, so that all would be despised as faithless and unbelieving. Therefore we have
boldly ventured to bear with this man and allow him to remain in the sacred ministry,
thinking the danger from one man's offense would be less evil than the perdition of the
souls of almost the entire people. On this whole subject I earnestly desire your holy advice
in writing.
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