Felix of Burgundy

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Saint Felix of Burgundy is a saint widely credited as the man who introduced Christianity to East Anglia in Eastern England.

He arrived in England sometime around AD 655 and made his way to Canterbury where he was ordained as a Bishop by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Honorius, at the request of King Sigeberht of East Anglia. He is recorded by Bede as having formed his episcopal see at Domnoc which is widely taken to mean Dunwich on the Suffolk coast, although other historians have suggested an alternative site at Walton on the Naze near Felixstowe, where a church and priory were dedicated to him by Roger Bigod in 1105. Soon afterwards, he established a church and school at Domnoc and also founded the abbey of Soham in Cambridgeshire. He was widely seen as being something of a bridge-builder between the Roman and Celtic traditions of Christianity. St Felix is said to have died on 8 March 647 (his feast day). His body was interred at Soham Abbey but this was pillaged by the Vikings in 869 and his tomb desecrated. During the reign of Cnut his remains were again moved to Ramsey Abbey on the Fens. He was succeeded as Bishop by Thomas of Jarrow.