Justus

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Justus

Justus (d. 10 November 627–631), was the fourth Archbishop of Canterbury

Archbishop of Canterbury

The Archbishop of Canterbury is the chief bishop and principal leader of the Church of England, the symbolic head of the worldwide Anglican Communion and the Diocesan Bishop of the Diocese of Canterbury, the Episcopal see that churches must be in communion with in order to be a part of the Anglican Communion....
, in England. A missionary sent to England to convert the Anglo-Saxons, he became the first Bishop of Rochester

Bishop of Rochester

The Bishop of Rochester, Kent is the Ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of Rochester in the Province of Canterbury.The diocese covers the west of the County of Kent....
in 604. He was forced to flee to Gaul in 616 after the death of King Æthelberht of Kent, but was reinstated in his diocese the next year. In 624 he became Archbishop of Canterbury, and during his term of office oversaw the despatch of missionaries to Northumbria

Northumbria

Northumbria is primarily the name of both a medieval petty kingdom of the Angles people, in what is now north east England and southern Scotland, and of the earldom which succeeded it when a united Anglo-Saxon kingdom became England....
.

Life
Justus was a native Italian and a member of the Gregorian mission

Gregorian mission

The Gregorian mission was the missionary endeavour sent by Pope Gregory the Great to the Anglo-Saxons in 596 AD, headed by Augustine of Canterbury, which attempted to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity....
sent to England by Pope Gregory I

Pope Gregory I

Pope Saint Gregory I or Gregory the Great was pope from 3 September 590 until his death.He is also known as Gregory the Dialogist in Eastern Orthodoxy because of his Dialogues....
.

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Justus (d. 10 November 627–631), was the fourth Archbishop of Canterbury

Archbishop of Canterbury

Bishop of Rochester

Northumbria

Life

Justus was a native Italian and a member of the Gregorian mission

Gregorian mission

Pope Gregory I

Pope Saint Gregory I or Gregory the Great was pope from 3 September 590 until his death.He is also known as Gregory the Dialogist in Eastern Orthodoxy because of his Dialogues....
. Justus probably arrived in England with the second group of missionaries, sent at the request of Augustine of Canterbury in 601, although some sources describe him as one of the original missionaries who arrived with Augustine in 597.

Augustine consecrated Justus as a bishop in 604, over a province including the Kentish

Kingdom of Kent

The Kingdom of Kent was a kingdom of Jutes in southeast England and was one of the seven traditional kingdoms of the so-called heptarchy....
city of Rochester, Because he was probably not a monk, unlike most of his fellow missionaries, Justus' cathedral clergy was likely to have been composed of secular clergy

Secular clergy

In the Roman Catholic Church, secular clergy are religious ministers, such as deacons and priests, who do not belong to a Catholic order. While regular clergy take vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience and place themselves under a Catholic order , secular clergy do not take vows and live in the world ....
rather than monks. A charter purporting to be from King Æthelberht of Kent, granting Justus land in Rochester, is of dubious authenticity.

While bishop, he and Mellitus

Mellitus

Mellitus was the first Bishop of London and the third Archbishop of Canterbury, and was one of the members of the Gregorian mission sent to England to convert the Anglo-Saxons....
, another of the missionaries and Bishop of London

Bishop of London

The Bishop of London is the Ordinary of the Church of England Diocese of London in the Province of Canterbury.The diocese covers 458 km? of 17 boroughs of Greater London north of the Thames and a small part of the County of Surrey....
, co-signed a letter written by Archbishop Laurence of Canterbury

Laurence of Canterbury

Laurence was the second Archbishop of Canterbury. He was a member of the Gregorian mission sent from Italy to England to convert the Anglo-Saxons, although the date of his arrival is disputed....
to the Irish bishops, urging the Celtic Church

Celtic Christianity

Celtic Christianity, or Insular Christianity broadly refers to the Early Middle Ages Christian practice that developed in Britain and Ireland before and during the post-Roman period, when Germanic invasions sharply reduced contact between the broadly Celts populations of Britons and Irish with Christians on the Continent until their s...
to adopt the Roman method of calculating

Computus

Computus is the calculation of the date of Easter in the Christian calendar. The name has been used for this procedure since the early Middle Ages, as it was one of the most important computations of the age....
the date of Easter

Easter

Easter is the most important religious feast in the Christianity liturgical year.Christians believe that Jesus was Resurrection of Jesus from the dead three days after his Crucifixion of Jesus, and celebrate this resurrection on Easter Day or Easter Sunday , two days after Good Friday....
. In 614 Justus attended the Council of Paris held by Chlothar II. A pagan backlash against Christianity took root following the death of Æthelberht in 616, forcing Justus to flee to Gaul

Gaul

Gaul is the name used for the region of Western Europe comprising part of present day northern Italy, France, Belgium, western Switzerland and the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the west bank of the River Rhine....
, along with Mellitus. By 617 though, Justus had been reinstalled to his bishopric. Mellitus also returned to England, but the prevailing pagan mood did not allow him to return to London; after Laurence's death, Mellitus became Archbishop of Canterbury.

Justus became Archbishop of Canterbury in 624, and received his pallium

Pallium

The Pallium or Pall is an ecclesiastical vestment in the Roman Catholic Church, originally peculiar to the Pope, but for many centuries bestowed by him on metropolitan bishops and primate s as a symbol of the jurisdiction delegated to them by the Holy See....
, the symbol of the jurisdiction entrusted to archbishops by the Holy See

Holy See

The Holy See is the episcopal jurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome, commonly known as the Pope, and is the preeminent episcopal see of the Roman Catholic Church, forming the central government of the Church....
, from Pope Boniface V

Pope Boniface V

Boniface V was pope from 619 to 625.He was consecrated as pope on December 23, 619. He did much for the religious conversion of England and enacted the decree by which churches became places of refuge for criminals....
. He then consecrated Romanus as his successor at Rochester. Boniface also gave Justus a letter congratulating him on King "Aduluald"'s conversion (probably King Eadbald of Kent

Eadbald of Kent

Eadbald was Kings of Kent of Kingdom of Kent from 616 until his death. He succeeded his father ?thelberht of Kent, who made Kent the dominant force in England during his reign and became the first Anglo-Saxon king to convert to Christianity....
). The letter is included in Bede's Ecclesiastical History
Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum

The Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum is a work in Latin by the Bede on the history of the Church in England, and of England generally; its main focus is on the conflict between Roman Catholic Church and Celtic Christianity....
. The historian D. P. Kirby argues that the reference to Eadbald makes it likely that it was Justus who converted the king, not Justus' predecessor at Canterbury, Laurence. Other historians, including Barbara Yorke

Barbara Yorke

Barbara Yorke is a historian of Anglo-Saxon England England.She studied history and archaeology at Exeter University, where she completed both her undergraduate degree and her Ph.D....
and Henry Mayr-Harting, conclude that Bede's account is correct, and Eadbald was converted by Laurence. Yorke argues that there were two kings of Kent during Eadbald's reign, Eadbald and an Æthelwald, with Æthelwald being the "Aduluald" referred to by Boniface.

Justus consecrated Paulinus

Paulinus of York

Paulinus was a Roman missionary and first Archbishop of York in medieval England. A member of the Gregorian mission, Paulinus was sent to England in 601 by Pope Gregory I as part of the second group of missionaries sent to convert the Anglo-Saxons....
as the first Bishop of York before Paulinus accompanied Æthelburg of Kent to Northumbria

Northumbria

Edwin of Northumbria

Saint Edwin was the List of monarchs of Northumbria of Deira and Bernicia - which would later become known as Northumbria - from about 616 until his death....
. Justus died on 10 November, between 627 and 631, and became regarded as a saint; he was given a feast day of 10 November. In the 1090s his remains were translated

Translation (relics)

In Christianity, the translation of relics is the removal of holy objects from one locality to another . This translation took different forms, including all-night vigils, and the carrying of the precious remains in a bier of gold or silver, overshadowed with silken canopy....
, or ritually moved, to a shrine beside the high altar of St Augustine's Abbey in Canterbury

Canterbury

Canterbury lies at the heart of the City of Canterbury, a local government district of Kent, in South East England. It lies on the River Stour....
. At about the same time a Life was written about him by Goscelin of Saint-Bertin

Goscelin

Goscelin , or Jocelyn, was a Benedictine biography writer who died about 1099. He was born in the north of France and became a monk of Abbey of Saint Bertin at Omer....
, as well as a poem by Reginald of Canterbury. Other material from Thomas of Elmham

Thomas Elmham

Thomas Elmham was an England chronicler, was probably born at North Elmham in Norfolk. He may have been the Thomas Elmham who was a scholar at King's Hall, Cambridge from 1389 to 1394....
, Gervase of Canterbury

Gervase of Canterbury

Gervase of Canterbury was an England chronicler....
, and William of Malmesbury

William of Malmesbury

William of Malmesbury , English historians in the Middle Ages, was born about the year 1080/1095, in Wiltshire. His father was Normans and his mother English....
, later medieval chroniclers, adds little to Bede's account of Justus' life.

Justus

Life

See also

External links