SAINT ADALBERT of MAGDEBURG

The Apostle of the Slavs and an archbishop. A German monk of the Benedictine Monastery of St. Maximin in Tréves, he was consecrated a bishop and sent to Russia in 961. Princess Olga of that land had asked Emperor Otto I the Great to provide her with a missionary. The son of Princess Olga took her crown from her soon after Adalbert arrived in Russia, and his mission companions were slain. He barely escaped with his own life and made his way to Maniz, where he spent four years. He was then named abbot of Weissenburg in Alsace and bishop of Magdeburg in Saxony. This was a diocese created to provide missionary programs for the Slavs. There Adalbert was made metropolitan of the Slavs and established the dioceses of Naumberg, Neissen, Merseberg, Brandenburg, Havelberg, and Posen. He also received two papal legates to assist him in his vast labor. Died: 981, Feastday: June 20.

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