Saint Augustine of Canterbury (?-604?), first archbishop of Canterbury, born in Rome. Pope Gregory I sent him to England from the monastery of Saint Andrew in Rome to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Christianity. When Augustine and his company of monks reached Provence in Gaul, they were so terrified by reports of the savage islanders that Augustine returned to Rome for permission to give up the attempt, but Gregory refused and sent them back. A favorable circumstance, of which they were ignorant, was that the wife of Ethelbert, the Saxon king of Kent, was a Christian.

Augustine landed at the mouth of the River Thames in Kent in 597. There Ethelbert received the embassy, listened patiently to Augustine's sermon, and promised the monks shelter and protection at Canterbury, where a residence was assigned to them. On June 2, 597, Ethelbert was baptized, and thereafter the new faith spread rapidly among the Anglo-Saxons. Augustine was made a bishop and given authority over all future English bishops. He built the first cathedral at Canterbury and founded a monastery just outside the city walls. About 603 he tried, unsuccessfully, to achieve uniformity in liturgy and practices between the Celtic and Roman churches. His feast day is May 28.