Chapter 7 Summary and Analysis

As Columcille breathes his last on Iona, the king of Canterbury is baptized by a timid librarian, Augustine, sent to Britain by Pope Gregory I, marking the first instance of a papal mission to pagans. Angles, Saxons, and Jutes have pushed the Celtic Britons, Christians in Patrick's day, westward, finally into Cornwall and Wales, and northward into Northumbria. Britons hate these pagans and have given no thought to evangelizing them. Having suffered nothing at the Britons' hands, the Irish have no inhibitions and launch a "spiritual invasion" of England from Lindisfarne. Aidan, Columcille's beloved disciple, who is on good terms with the British Celts, deserves more than Augustine to be called "Apostle of England", but Augustine is installed by Rome. Slowly, his stricter version of the faith spreads north and westward, eventually encountering-and clashing with-Celtic Christianity. The Synod of Whitby (664) considers...