The 108 Martyrs of World War II, known also as 108 Blessed Polish Martyrs, were Roman Catholics from Poland killed during World War II by the Nazis.

Their liturgical feast day is 12 June. The 108 were beatified on 13 June 1999 by Pope John Paul II at Warsaw, Poland. The group comprises 3 bishops, 52 priests, 26 members of male religious orders, 3 seminarians, 8 religious sisters and 9 lay people. There are two parishes named for the 108 Martyrs of World War II in Powiercie  in Koło County, and in Malbork, Poland.

Bishops

  • Antoni Julian Nowowiejski, (1858–1941 KL Działdowo), bishop
  • Leon Wetmański, (1886–1941 KL Działdowo), bishop
  • Władysław Goral, (1898–1945 KL Sachsenhausen), bishop

Priests

  • Adam Bargielski, priest from Myszyniec (1903–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Aleksy Sobaszek, priest (1895–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Alfons Maria Mazurek, Carmelite friar, prior, priest (1891–1944, shot by the Gestapo)
  • Alojzy Liguda, Society of the Divine Word, priest (1898–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Anastazy Jakub Pankiewicz, Franciscan friar, priest (1882–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Anicet Kopliński, Capuchin friar of German descent, priest in Warsaw (1875–1941)
  • Antoni Beszta-Borowski, priest, dean of Bielsk Podlaski (1880–1943, shot near Bielsk Podlaski)
  • Antoni Leszczewicz, Marian Father, priest (1890–1943, burnt to death in Rosica, Belarus)
  • Antoni Rewera, priest, dean of the Cathedral Chapter in Sandomierz (1869–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Antoni Świadek, priest from Bydgoszcz (1909–1945 KL Dachau)
  • Antoni Zawistowski, priest (1882–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Bolesław Strzelecki, priest (1896–1941 KL Auschwitz)
  • Bronisław Komorowski, priest (1889–22 March 1940 KL Stutthof)
  • Dominik Jędrzejewski, priest (1886–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Edward Detkens, priest (1885–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Edward Grzymała, priest (1906–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Emil Szramek, priest (1887–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Fidelis Chojnacki, Capuchin friar, priest (1906–1942, KL Dachau)
  • Florian Stępniak, Capuchin friar, priest (1912–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Franciszek Dachtera, priest (1910–23 August 1942 KL Dachau)
  • Franciszek Drzewiecki, Orionine Father, priest (1908–1942 KL Dachau); from Zduny, he was condemned to heavy work in the plantation of Dachau. While he was bending over tilling the soil, he adored the consecrated hosts kept in a small box in front of him. While he was going to the gas chamber, he encouraged his companions, saying “We offer our life for God, for the Church and for our Country”.
  • Franciszek Rogaczewski, priest from Gdańsk (1892–1940, shot in Stutthof or in Piaśnica, Pomerania)
  • Franciszek Rosłaniec, priest (1889–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Henryk Hlebowicz, priest (1904–1941, shot at Borisov in Belarus)
  • Henryk Kaczorowski, priest from Włocławek (1888–1942)
  • Henryk Krzysztofik, religious order, priest (1908–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Hilary Paweł Januszewski, religious order, priest (1907–1945 KL Dachau)
  • Jan Antonin Bajewski, Conventual Franciscan friar, priest (1915–1941 KL Auschwitz); of Niepokalanow. These were the closest collaborators of St Maximilian Kolbe in the fight for God’s cause and together suffered and helped each other spiritually in their offering their lives at Auschwitz
  • Jan Franciszek Czartoryski, Dominican friar, priest (1897–1944)
  • Jan Nepomucen Chrzan, priest (1885–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Jerzy Kaszyra, Marian Father, priest (1910–1943, burnt to death in Rosica, Belarus)
  • Józef Achilles Puchała, Franciscan friar, priest (1911–1943, killed near Iwieniec, Belarus)
  • Józef Cebula, Missionary Oblate, priest (23 March 1902–9 May 1941 KL Mauthausen)[1]
  • Józef Czempiel, priest (1883–1942 KL Mauthausen)
  • Józef Innocenty Guz, Franciscan friar, priest (1890–1940 KL Sachsenhausen)
  • Józef Jankowski, Pallotine, priest, (1910 born in Czyczkowy near Brusy, Kashubia (died 16 October 1941 in KL Auschwitz beaten by kapo)
  • Józef Kowalski, Salesian, priest (1911–1942)
  • Józef Kurzawa, priest (1910–1940)
  • Józef Kut, priest (1905–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Józef Pawłowski, priest (1890–9 January 1942 KL Dachau)
  • Józef Stanek, Pallottine, priest (1916–23 September 1944, murdered in Warsaw)
  • Józef Straszewski, priest (1885–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Karol Herman Stępień, Franciscan friar, priest (1910–1943, killed near Iwieniec, Belarus)
  • Kazimierz Gostyński, priest (1884–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Kazimierz Grelewski, priest (1907–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Kazimierz Sykulski, priest (1882–1942 KL Auschwitz)
  • Krystyn Gondek, Franciscan friar, priest (1909–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Leon Nowakowski, priest (1913–1939)
  • Ludwik Mzyk, Society of the Divine Word, priest (1905–1940)
  • Ludwik Pius Bartosik, Conventual Franciscan friar, priest (1909–1941 KL Auschwitz); of Niepokalanow. These were the closest collaborators of St Maximilian Kolbe in the fight for God’s cause and together suffered and helped each other spiritually in their offering their lives at Auschwitz
  • Ludwik Roch Gietyngier, priest from Częstochowa (1904–1941 KL Dachau)
  • Maksymilian Binkiewicz, priest (1913–24 July 1942, beaten, died in KL Dachau)
  • Marian Gorecki, priest (1903–22 March 1940 KL Stutthof)
  • Marian Konopiński, Capuchin friar, priest (1907–1 January 1943 KL Dachau)
  • Marian Skrzypczak, priest (1909–1939 shot in Plonkowo)
  • Michał Oziębłowski, priest (1900–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Michał Piaszczyński, priest (1885–1940 KL Sachsenhausen)
  • Michał Woźniak, priest (1875–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Mieczysław Bohatkiewicz, priest (1904–4 March 1942, shot in Berezwecz)
  • Narcyz Putz, priest (1877–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Narcyz Turchan, priest (1879–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Piotr Edward Dankowski, priest (1908–3 April 1942 KL Auschwitz)
  • Roman Archutowski, priest (1882–1943 KL Majdanek)
  • Roman Sitko, priest (1880–1942 KL Auschwitz)
  • Stanisław Kubista, Society of the Divine Word, priest (1898–1940 KL Sachsenhausen)
  • Stanisław Kubski, priest (1876–1942, prisoner in KL Dachau, killed in Hartheim near Linz)
  • Stanisław Mysakowski, priest (1896–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Stanisław Pyrtek, priest (1913–4 March 1942, shot in Berezwecz)
  • Stefan Grelewski, priest (1899–1941 KL Dachau)
  • Wincenty Matuszewski, priest (1869–1940)
  • Władysław Błądziński, Michaelite, priest (1908–1944, KL Gross-Rosen)
  • Władysław Demski, priest (1884–28 May 1940, KL Sachsenhausen)
  • Władysław Maćkowiak, priest (1910–4 March 1942 shot in Berezwecz)
  • Władysław Mączkowski, priest (1911–20 August 1942 KL Dachau)
  • Władysław Miegoń, priest, commandor lieutnant (1892–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Włodzimierz Laskowski, priest (1886–1940 KL Gusen)
  • Wojciech Nierychlewski, religious, priest (1903–1942, KL Auschwitz)
  • Zygmunt Pisarski, priest (1902–1943)
  • Zygmunt Sajna, priest (1897–1940, shot at Palmiry, near Warsaw)
  • Religious Brothers
  • Brunon Zembol, friar (1905–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Grzegorz Bolesław Frąckowiak, friar (1911–1943, guillotined in Dresden)
  • Józef Zapłata, friar (1904–1945 KL Dachau)
  • Marcin Oprządek, friar (1884–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Piotr Bonifacy Żukowski, friar (1913–1942 KL Auschwitz)
  • Stanisław Tymoteusz Trojanowski, friar (1908–1942 KL Auschwitz)
  • Symforian Ducki, friar (1888–1942 KL Auschwiitz)

Nuns and Religious Sisters

  • Alicja Maria Jadwiga Kotowska, sister (1899–1939, executed at Piaśnica, Pomerania)
  • Ewa Noiszewska, sister (1885–1942, executed at Góra Pietrelewicka near Slonim, Belarus)
  • Julia Rodzińska, Dominican sister (1899–20 February 1945 KL Stutthof); she died having contracted typhoid serving the Jewish women prisoners in a hut for which she had volunteered.
  • Katarzyna Celestyna Faron (1913–1944 KL Auschwitz); (1913–1944), had offered her life for the conversion of an Old Catholic bishop Władysław Faron (no relation). She was arrested by the Gestapo and condemned to Auschwitz camp. She put up heroically with all the abuses of the camp and died on Easter Sunday 1944. The bishop later returned to the Catholic Church).
  • Maria Antonina Kratochwil, (1881–1942)
  • Maria Klemensa Staszewska, (1890–1943 KL Auschwitz)
  • Marta Wołowska, (1879–1942, executed at Góra Pietrelewicka near Slonim, Belarus)
  • Mieczysława Kowalska, sister (1902–1941 KL Dzialdowo)

Roman Catholic Laity

  • Bronisław Kostkowski, alumnus (1915–1942 KL Dachau)
  • Czesław Jóźwiak (1919–1942, guillotined in a prison in Dresden)
  • Edward Kaźmierski (1919–1942, guillotined in a prison in Dresden)
  • Edward Klinik (1919–1942, guillotined in a prison in Dresden)
  • Franciszek Kęsy (1920–1942, guillotined in a prison in Dresden)
  • Franciszek Stryjas (1882–31 July 1944, Kalisz prison)
  • Jarogniew Wojciechowski (1922–1942, guillotined in a prison in Dresden)
  • Marianna Biernacka (1888–13 July 1943), offered her life for her unborn grandchild and was executed instead of her pregnant daughter-in-law
  • Natalia Tułasiewicz (1906–31 March 1945, died in KL Ravensbrück)
  • Stanisław Starowieyski (1895–13 April 1941 KL Dachau)
  • Tadeusz Dulny, alumnus (1914–1942 KL Dachau)
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Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus goes back at least to the 11th century, but through the 16th century, it remained a private devotion, often tied to devotion to the Five Wounds of Christ. The first feast of the Sacred Heart was celebrated on August 31, 1670, in Rennes, France, through the efforts of Fr. Jean Eudes (1602-1680). From Rennes, the devotion spread, but it took the visions of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque (1647-1690) for the devotion to become universal.

In all of these visions, in which Jesus appeared to St. Margaret Mary, the Sacred Heart of Jesus played a central role. The “great apparition,” which took place on June 16, 1675, during the octave of the Feast of Corpus Christi, is the source of the modern Feast of the Sacred Heart. In that vision, Christ asked St. Margaret Mary to request that the Feast of the Sacred Heart be celebrated on the Friday after the octave (or eighth day) of the Feast of Corpus Christi, in reparation for the ingratitude of men for the sacrifice that Christ had made for them. The Sacred Heart of Jesus represents not simply His physical heart but His love for all mankind.

The devotion became quite popular after St. Margaret Mary’s death in 1690, but, because the Church initially had doubts about the validity of St. Margaret Mary’s visions, it wasn’t until 1765 that the feast was celebrated officially in France. Almost 100 years later, in 1856, Pope Pius IX, at the request of the French bishops, extended the feast to the universal Church. It is celebrated on the day requested by our Lord—the Friday after the octave of Corpus Christi, or 19 days after Pentecost Sunday.

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Saint Barnabas was one of the Seventy Apostles and the companion of the Apostle Paul on some of his missionary voyages. A Jew, born in Cyprus and named Joseph, he sold his property, gave the proceeds to the Apostles, who gave him the name Barnabas (“son of consolation”) because he was gifted at comforting people’s souls. He lived in common with the earliest converts to Christianity in Jerusalem.

He persuaded the community there to accept Paul as a disciple, was sent to Antioch, Syria, to look into the community there, and brought Paul there from Tarsus. With Paul he brought Antioch’s donation to the Jerusalem community during a famine, and returned to Antioch with John Mark, his cousin. The three went on a missionary journey to Cyprus, Perga (when John Mark went to Jerusalem), and Antioch in Pisidia, where they were so violently opposed by the Jews that they decided to preach to the pagans.

Then they went on to Iconium and Lystra in Lycaonia, where they were first acclaimed gods and then stoned out of the city, and then returned to Antioch in Syria. When a dispute arose regarding the observance of the Jewish rites, Paul and Barnabas went to Jerusalem, where, at a council, it was decided that pagans did not have to be circumcised to be baptized.

On their return to Antioch, Barnabas wanted to take John Mark on another visitation to the cities where they had preached, but Paul objected because of John Mark’s desertion of them in Perga. Paul and Barnabas parted, and Barnabas returned to Cyprus with Mark; nothing further is heard of him, though it is believed his rift with Paul was ultimately healed.

Tradition has Barnabas preaching in Alexandria and Rome, the founder of the Cypriote Church, and has him stoned to death at Salamis about the year 61. His feast day is June 11.

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According to a pious legend, Saint Olivia was described as a ravishing beauty of 13 years when Saracens captured her at Palermo, Sicily in the 9th century. She was deported to Tunis where she began to perform miracles and convert Muslims to Christianity.

Wishing to get rid of her, but fearing her power, her captors abandoned her in a forest, giving her to the beasts. Some hunters found her and took her themselves as a slave, but she converted them to the Faith. Exasperated Muslim authorities arrested, tortured, and beheaded her. At the moment of her death, her soul was seen to fly to heaven in the form of a dove.

She has been honoured in Carthage and Palermo, and was held in great esteem by Christians and Muslims. The mosque of Tunis is called the Mosque of Olivia, and Tunisian Muslims say that who speaks ill of her is always punished by God.

Saint Olivia is considered a Patron Saint of Music and Palermo, Italy.

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Poet, teacher, orator and defender of the faith, Saint Ephrem is the only Syrian recognized as a doctor of the Church. He took upon himself the special task of opposing the many false doctrines rampant at his time, always remaining a true and forceful defender of the Catholic Church.

Born in Nisibis, Mesopotamia, he was baptized as a young man and became famous as a teacher in his native city. When the Christian emperor had to cede Nisibis to the Persians, Ephrem, along with many Christians, fled as a refugee to Edessa. He is credited with attracting great glory to the biblical school there. He was ordained a deacon but declined becoming a priest (and was said to have avoided episcopal consecration by feigning madness!).

He had a prolific pen and his writings best illumine his holiness. Although he was not a man of great scholarship, his works reflect deep insight and knowledge of the Scriptures. In writing about the mysteries of humanity’s redemption, Ephrem reveals a realistic and humanly sympathetic spirit and a great devotion to the humanity of Jesus. It is said that his poetic account of the Last Judgment inspired Dante.

It is surprising to read that he wrote hymns against the heretics of his day. He would take the popular songs of the heretical groups and, using their melodies, compose beautiful hymns embodying orthodox doctrine. Ephrem became one of the first to introduce song into the Church’s public worship as a means of instruction for the faithful. His many hymns have earned him the title “Harp of the Holy Spirit.”

He preferred a simple, austere life, living in a small cave overlooking the city of Edessa. It was here he died around 373.

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Saint William of York, born around the year 1110, was the son of Count Herbert, treasurer to Henry I. He was elected archbishop of York in 1140. William’s election was challenged on the grounds of simony and unchastity. He was cleared by Rome, but later a new Pope suspended William, and in 1147 he was deposed as archbishop of York.

William then retired to Winchester where he led the austere life of a monk, practicing much prayer and mortification. Upon the death of his accusers, Pope Anastastius IV restored William his See and made him archbishop. William died in the year 1154.

After his death miracles were reported at his tomb, and in 1227 he was declared a saint. His Feast Day is June 8.

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The Feast of Corpus Christi, or the Feast of the Body and Blood of Christ (as it is often called today), goes back to the 13th century, but it celebrates something far older: the institution of the Sacrament of Holy Communion at the Last Supper. While Holy Thursday is also a celebration of this mystery, the solemn nature of Holy Week, and the focus on Christ’s Passion on Good Friday, overshadows that aspect of Holy Thursday.

Thus, in 1246, Bishop Robert de Thorete of the Belgina diocese of Liège, at the suggestion of St. Juliana of Mont Cornillon (also in Belgium), convened a synod and instituted the celebration of the feast. From Liège, the celebration began to spread, and, on September 8, 1264, Pope Urban IV issued the papal bull “Transiturus,” which established the Feast of Corpus Christi as a universal feast of the Church, to be celebrated on the Thursday following Trinity Sunday.

At the request of Pope Urban IV, St. Thomas Aquinas composed the office (the official prayers of the Church) for the feast. This office is widely considered one of the most beautiful in the traditional Roman Breviary (the official prayer book of the Divine Office or Liturgy of the Hours), and it is the source of the famous Eucharistic hymns “Pange Lingua Gloriosi” and “Tantum Ergo Sacramentum.”

For centuries after the celebration was extended to the universal Church, the feast was also celebrated with a eucharistic procession, in which the Sacred Host was carried throughout the town, accompanied by hymns and litanies. The faithful would venerate the Body of Christ as the procession passed by. In recent years, this practice has almost disappeared, though some parishes still hold a brief procession around the outside of the parish church.

In countries where it is not a Holy Day of Obligation such as the United States, The Feast of Corpus Christi is celebrated on the Sunday after Holy Trinity.

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Saint Paul was the Bishop of Constantinople, during the period of bitter controversy in the Church over the Arian heresy. Elected in 336 to succeed Alexander of Constantinople, the following year he was exiled to Pontus by Emperor Constantius II.

Because of his staunch position against Arianism, Paul was replaced by the heretical bishop Macedonius. Allowed to return in 338, Paul was again exiled by the Arians, who had the support of many in the imperial government, but returned about 340. Once more he was seized and, at the order of Emperor Constantius, he was exiled to Mesopotamia. Brought back in 344, he was sent yet again into exile, this time to Cucusus, in Armenia.

Here he was deliberately starved and finally strangled by Arian supporters. He is considered a martyr for the orthodox cause and was a close friend St. Athanasius.

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Saint Norbert was born at Xanten in the Rhineland, about the year 1080. The early part of his life was devoted to the world and its pleasures. He entered upon the ecclesiastical state in a worldly spirit.

The thunderstorm had boiled up suddenly as Norbert was out riding. Norbert, who had always chosen the easy way, would never have deliberately gone on a journey that promised danger, risk, or discomfort. He had moved easily from the comforts of the noble family he was born into at about 1080 to the pleasure-loving German court. He had no hesitations about joining in any opportunity to enjoy himself, no matter what the source of that pleasure. To ensure his success at court, he also had no qualms about accepting holy orders as a canon and whatever financial benefices that came with that position, although he did hesitate at becoming a priest and the implied responsibilities that came with that vocation.

But now high winds pushed and pulled at his fashionable coif, rain slashed at his fancy clothes, and dark roiling clouds pressed night down upon his light thoughts. A sudden flash of lightning split the dark and his horse bucked, throwing Norbert to the ground.

For almost an hour, the still form of the courtier lay unmoving. Even the rain soaking his clothes and the howl of thunder did not bring him back to consciousness and life. When he awoke his first words were, “Lord, what do you want me to do?” — the same words Saul spoke on the road to Damascus. In response Norbert heard in his heart, “Turn from evil and do good. Seek peace and pursue it.”

He immediately returned to the place of his birth, Xanten, to devote himself to prayer and penance. He now embraced the instruction for the priesthood he had avoided and was ordained in 1115. His complete conversion and new ways caused some to denounce the former courtier as a hypocrite. Norbert’s response was to give everything he owned to the poor and to go to the pope for permission to preach.

With this commission in hand, he became an itinerant preacher, traveling through Europe with his two companions. In an extreme response to his old ways, he now chose the most difficult ways to travel — walking barefoot in the middle of winter through snow and ice. Unfortunately the two companions who followed him died from the ill-effects of exposure. But Norbert was gaining the respect of those sincere clerics who had despised him before. The bishop of Laon wanted Norbert to help reform the canons in his see, but the canons wanted nothing to do with Norbert’s type of reform which they saw as far too strict. The bishop, not wanting to lose this holy man, offered Norbert land where he could start his own community. In a lonely valley called Prmontr, began his community with thirteen canons. Despite the strictness of his regulation, or perhaps because it, his reforms attracted many disciples until eight abbeys and two convents were involved. Even the canons who had originally rejected him asked to be part of the reform.

In Norbert’s community we have the first evidence of lay affiliation with a religious order. This came about when a count Theobald wanted to join Norbert. Norbert realized that Theobald was not called to holy orders but to marriage and worldly duties. But he did not entirely reject Theobald, giving him a rule and devotions as well as a scapular to wear to identify him as part of the community.

It was on the trip accompanying Theobald to his marriage, that Norbert was spotted by Emperor Lothair and chosen as bishop of Magdebourg. Legend has it the porter refused to let Norbert into his new residence, assuming he was a beggar. When the crowd pointed out to the flustered porter that this was the new bishop Norbert told the porter, “You were right the first time.” Norbert carried the love of reform that he had found in his own life to his new diocese. As usual, this made him many enemies and he was almost assassinated. Disgusted with the citizens desire to keep to their old ways, he left the city, but was soon called back — not because the citizens missed him but because the emperor and the pope pressured them.

When two rival popes were elected after the death of Honorius II, Norbert helped try to heal the Church by getting his admirer the emperor to support the first elected, Innocent II. At the end of his life he was made an archbishop but he died soon after on June 6, 1134 at the age of 53.

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Saint Boniface of Mainz is often called The Apostle of Germany. Named Winfrith by his well-to-do English parents, Boniface was born probably near Exeter, Devon, England. As a boy, he studied in Benedictine monastery schools and became a monk himself in the process. For years he lived in relative peace, studying, teaching, and praying. In his early 40s he left the seclusion of the monastery to do missionary work on the Continent. Because his first efforts in Frisia (now the Netherlands) were unsuccessful, Winfrith  went to Rome in search of direction. Pope Gregory II renamed him Boniface, “doer of good,” and delegated him to spread the gospel message in Germany.

In 719 the missionary monk set out on what was to be a very fruitful venture. He made converts by the thousands. Once in Saxony, Boniface encountered a tribe worshiping a Norse deity in the form of a huge oak tree. Boniface walked up to the tree, removed his shirt, took up an axe, and without a word he hacked down the six foot wide wooden god. Boniface stood on the trunk, and asked, “How stands your mighty god? My God is stronger than he.”

In 722 the Pope consecrated him bishop for all of Germany. For 30 years Boniface worked to reform and organize the Church, linking the various local communities firmly with Rome. He enlisted the help of English monks and nuns to preach to the people, strengthen their Christian spirit, and assure their allegiance to the pope. He founded the monastery of Fulda, now the yearly meeting place of Germany’s Roman Catholic bishops. About 746 Boniface was appointed archbishop of Mainz, where he settled for several years as head of all the German churches.

Over the years he kept up an extensive correspondence, asking directives of the popes, giving information about the many Christian communities, and relaying to the people the popes’ wishes. In 752, as the pope’s emissary, he crowned Pepin king of the Franks. In his 80s and still filled with his characteristic zeal, Boniface went back to preach the gospel in Frisia. There, in 754 near the town of Dokkum, Boniface and several dozen companions were waylaid by a group of savage locals and put to death. His remains were later taken to Fulda, where he was revered as a martyr to the Christian faith.

Boniface was a man of action, but he was also sensitive to the feelings of those with whom he came in contact. His organizing genius and loyalty to Rome influenced Germany’s Christianity for centuries.

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