St Willibrord
658-739 ~ Willibrord was born in Northumbria, England. His Saxon parents sent him when only seven years old to the monastery in Ripon to be educated by St Wilfrid. At the age of about twenty he went to Ireland to undertake further study in the Irish monasteries. He was ordained when he was thirty years of age and not long after his ordination, he was sent with eleven English monks on a mission to Friesland (now known as the Netherlands). King Pepin welcomed him and his missionaries and Pope Sergius I made Willibrord the Bishop of Friesland and renamed him, "Clement".
Willibrord founded a monastery in Luxemburg at Echternach and then went further a field to Denmark, which was still a pagan country, spreading Christianity. He narrowly escaped death when a pagan leader named Radbod attacked his group of missionaries. A lot of Willibrord’s hard work was ruined by the pagans, but Radbod died so Willibrord was able to set up a mission programme with St Boniface. They were so successful that they travelled to Germany to preach. Willibrord died on a retreat in Luxemburg.