Saint Henry
Holy Roman Emperor
- Feast Day
- July 13
- Life
- 973–1024
- Canonized
- 1146
- Order
- Benedictine Oblate (lay)
- Born
- Bad Abbach (or Hildesheim), Duchy of Bavaria
Saint Henry, born May 6, 973, was the son of Duke Henry the Quarrelsome of Bavaria and Gisela of Burgundy. Educated at the cathedral school of Hildesheim under Bishop Saint Wolfgang of Regensburg, he succeeded his father as Duke of Bavaria in 995. Elected King of Germany in 1002 after the death of his cousin Otto III without an heir, he was crowned at Mainz on June 7, 1002. He was crowned King of Italy at Pavia in 1004 and Holy Roman Emperor by Pope Benedict VIII at Saint Peter's on February 14, 1014.
Henry's reign was marked by the consolidation of imperial authority, the suppression of internal revolts, and three Italian campaigns to defend the papacy and the Lombard kingdom. He founded the Diocese of Bamberg in 1007, endowing it with imperial estates as a center of evangelization for the still partly pagan Slavs east of the Saale River, and built there the cathedral that holds his tomb.
He supported the monastic reform movement radiating from Cluny and Gorze, restored numerous Benedictine houses including Verdun and Magdeburg, and entered the Benedictine confraternity as an oblate at the Abbey of Saint-Vanne in Verdun. With his wife Saint Cunigunde of Luxembourg, he lived a chaste marriage; the couple had no children, and a tradition first attested in the late eleventh century holds that they took mutual vows of continence (a tradition still treated cautiously by historians).
Henry died at the imperial palace of Grone, near Gottingen, on July 13, 1024, and was buried in Bamberg Cathedral, where his tomb sculpted by Tilman Riemenschneider (1499-1513) survives. Pope Eugene III canonized him in 1146; his wife Cunigunde was canonized by Pope Innocent III in 1200.
The Optional Memorial of Saint Henry honors the only Holy Roman Emperor canonized by the universal Church (the cult of Charlemagne, canonized by the antipope Paschal III in 1165, has never been confirmed by Rome). Henry's life testifies that the duties of secular government, faithfully discharged, are themselves a path to holiness, and his foundation of Bamberg made the Christian kingdom the instrument of evangelization of the Slavic East.
Patronages
Holy Roman Emperors · Benedictine oblates · the childless · the Diocese of Bamberg · Finland (with Saint Henry of Uppsala)
Catholic Churches Named After Saint Henry
20 parishes on Catholic Church Times share Saint Henry's name. Find their Mass times, confession schedules, and adoration hours:
- St. Henry's - Inyathi
- St. Henry — Charleston, MO
- Coalisland (Ballyclog & Donaghenry) — Coalisland (Ballyclog
- St. Henry Catholic Church — Leask, SK
- St. Henry's — Fort Vermillion, AB
- Saint Henry Catholic Church — Eau Galle, WI
- St. Henry — Melville, SK
- St. Henry — Belleville, IL
- Corpus Christi (Parish of St John Henry Newman) - Leeds — Leeds, ENG
- St. John Henry Newman Center — Cape Girardeau, MO
- St. Henry Parish (Owasso) — Owasso, OK
- Cardinal John Henry Newman Catholic Student Center — Corpus Christi, TX
- St. Henry — Henry, SD
- St. Henry Mission — Dexter, OR
- St. Henry — Lower Salem, OH
- Saint Henry's Roman Catholic Church — Bayonne, NY
- Saint Henry Catholic Church — Rogersville, TN
- St. John Henry Newman University Parish — Jonesboro, AR
- Christ the King Parish: Saint Henry Church — Ferdinand, IN
- Saint Henry Catholic Church — Hardin, KY
Sources