December 5th. St. Brinus.

St. Brinus is commemorated in some of the parishes of our diocese on this date, for his missionary work centred on Dorchester-upon-Thames, a riverside village with a famous Abbey, between Oxford and Reading, and located within our diocese. He was born in Northern Italy, possibly near Genoa, and was sent by Pope Honorius l to continue the evangelisation of Britain in the aftermath of St. Augustine's mission. He was destined for the Midlands, but on passing through the territory of the West Saxons in 635 he found them so pagan that he advanced no further. The local king, Cynegils, sought instruction in the Christian faith and was to be baptised, while his daughter was to marry St. Oswald, King of Northumbria. Birinus chose to make his headquarters at Dorchester because it was a well-developed and conveniently located Romano-British town. His mission lasted some 15 years; in the latter part of it he established a church at Winchester, which was to develop into a major Christian centre to the detriment of Dorchester. Birinus died in about 650 and forty years later the then Bishop of Winchester Hedda, provided a shrine there for his remains, although this honour was also claimed by Dorcehester Abbey itself in the Middle Ages.