Saint of the Day – Saint Hilda of Whitby, 614–680 AD
Whitby Abbey “All who knew her called her mother because of her outstanding devotion and grace” (The Venerable Bede) A consecrated virgin, a skilled and wise leader and teacher, Abbess of Hartlepool and then Whitby (Streonshalh), a ‘double monastery’ where both male and female religious worshipped together but lived separately. She attended the Synod of Whitby called by King Oswiu, which agreed to keep the feast of Easter according to the Roman calendar, as well as agreeing the adoption of the Roman tonsure. This decision led to the monks of Lindisfarne, led by Colman, moving first to Iona and thence to Ireland; the declarations of the Synod may be seen as one stage in the ‘Romanisation’ of the church in the British Isles, although Roman practice was already widespread and this Synod affected the kingdom of Northumbria alone. When she died at the age of sixty-six, a nun saw her soul being carried to heaven by angels and local legend says that when sea birds fly over...