He was one of the companions of St. Augustine on the mission from Rome in 597, and at first acted as an emissary, reporting to and from Pope St. Gregory the Great, and carrying the latter’s instructions on organisation of the English church. St. Augustine chose him as his successor, and he became Archbishop of Canterbury in 604. His policy was one of consolidation, but was achieved not without many setbacks. The Christian convert king of Kent, Ethelbert, died, and his successor Edbald proved uncooperative to Christians, taking a non-Christian stance by marrying his own stepmother. Several of the early missionaries, including St. Mellitus and St. Justus, withdrew to France, and Laurence was tempted to join them until, so the Venerable Bede tells us, he had a dream in which St. Peter gave him a sound thrashing for trying to evade his responsibilities. This seems to be the famous Petrine ‘Quo vadis?’ story translated into other terms. At any rate, Laurence persevered, King Edbald was converted and the mission went ahead. Laurence was buried in the Canterbury monastery of SS. Peter and Paul (the ruins of which may be seen east of the Cathedral); in 1091 his remains, and those of other early saints, were transferred to new tombs in the Cathedral.