Saint Deiniol of Bangor
The eleventh of September in the Orthodox Church is the feast day of the great Welsh bishop, Saint Deiniol of Bangor [also Daniel or Denoual]. The grandson of Saint Pabo Post Prydain, son of Dynod Bwr and cousin of Saint Asa, Deiniol was the founder of two major monasteries in sub-Roman Wales, and a key figure in the struggle against the Pelagian heresy in Britain.
Deiniol’s family was from Yr Hen Ogledd – that is to say, Strathclyde – in the British North. His grandfather, the ‘Pillar of Britain’, had long held and defended the north against Pictish invasions. However, after his grandfather’s retirement to a hermitage, the old northern kingdom splintered. Dynod Bwr ended up having to take his family – Deiniol included – into Powys, where they were given a minor holding.
Deiniol was sent to study with Saint Cadog Ddoeth, where he learned the love of Christ and the spiritual wisdom of the Welsh hermits. He himself chose to become a hermit himself, and left Powys for Gwynedd to the north. He met with Maelgwn King of Gwynedd, who was impressed enough with the young hermit that he granted him enough land for a small enclosure on the Menai Strait. This would become the monastery, later cathedral, of Bangor Fawr.
Saint Deiniol’s hagiography has it that when he was an abbot, some thieves stole oxen from a local ploughman, leaving the monks without the means to plough the fields. At Saint Deiniol’s behest, wild stags emerged from the woods and allowed themselves to be yoked to the plough, and they turned the fields for the ploughman. This story is remarkably similar to one which appears in the Life of Saint Neot of Cornwall.
Saint Deiniol spent the rest of his life as an abbot; he was later consecrated as a bishop by Saint Dyfrig of Caerleon. Deiniol also reconsecrated a monastery that had been founded by his father Dynod at Bangor-is-y-coed on the River Dee. Under Saint Deiniol’s rule, the monastery at Bangor Fawr grew to become the largest spiritual centre in Wales, home to over two thousand monks. Saint Deiniol, alongside Saints Dyfrig and Dewi, attended the Synod of Llandewi Brefi in 545, where the heresy of Pelagius was again condemned and where the penitential rules and discipline for monks were firmly established. His presence at this Synod indicates the high esteem in which he was held by the Church.
Saint Deiniol reposed in the Lord on the eleventh of September, 584. He was buried on the isle of Bardsey, the ‘Isle of 20,000 Saints’. Saint Deiniol’s cultus has been particularly pronounced in northern Wales. Holy bishop Deiniol, confessor and founder of monasteries, pray unto Christ our God that our souls may be saved!
By thy teaching and pious life
Thou didst shine forth in the age of Saints, O Hierarch Deiniol,
And becoming Bangor’s first bishop
Thou wast an instrument of God's grace, leading many to salvation.
Pray, O Saint, that we may be led
Into the Way of Truth that our souls may be saved.
Bangor Cathedral, Gwynedd
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