Bishop of Lincoln

The Bishop of Lincoln heads the (Anglican) Diocese of Lincoln in the Province of Canterbury. The bishops were in communion with the See of Rome until the English Reformation of the 1530s.

The present diocese covers the county of Lincolnshire. The Bishop's seat, or cathedra, is located in the Cathedral Church of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the city of Lincoln. This was originally a minster church founded around 653 and re-founded as a cathedral in 1072.

The current bishop of Lincoln is the Right Reverend Dr John Saxbee, the 71st (34th Anglican) Bishop of Lincoln, who signs "John Lincoln". His official residence is Bishop's House in Lincoln.

History

Identifying the origin of the diocese has posed some difficulty. The original diocese of Lindsey (Lindine) was founded in 628 by the Roman missionary, Saint Paulinus of York, almost certainly with its seat at the church of St Paul-in-the-Bail in Lincoln. This did not outlive Paulinus's flight south in 633.

A subsequent diocese was considered the foundation of Saint Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury, out of the diocese of Lindisfarne. The seat of this supposed Bishop of Lindsey at "Sidnacester" (Syddensis) has been placed, by various commentators, at Caistor, Louth, Horncastle and, most often, at Stow, all in present-day Lincolnshire. More recent research has concluded, however, that the seat was, in fact, the original foundation of 628 in Lincoln itself.

Due to the threat of Viking invasion, the bishop's seat was moved to the cathedral at Dorchester-on-Thames in present-day Oxfordshire in 971. Each subsequent bishop was called Bishop of Dorchester until the seat returned to Lincoln and the diocese renamed in 1072.

ources

* http://www.trin.cam.ac.uk/chartwww/Bishops/epsuccession.html
* http://www.katolsk.no/utenriks/index_en.htm
* http://www.catholic-hierarchy.org
* "Cathedrals and Abbeys of England & Wales Richard Morris, 1979, J.M. Dent & Sons Ltd"
* "Discovering Cathedrals David Pepin, 2004, Shire Publications Ltd"
* "The Observer's Book of Cathedrals Anthony S.B.New, 1972, Frederick Warne & Co Ltd"
* "Haydn's Book of Dignities (1894) Joseph Haydn/Horace Ockerby, reprinted 1969"
* "Whitaker's Almanack 1883 to 2004 Joseph Whittaker & Sons/A&C Black, London"
* "Handbook of British Chronology (2nd ed, 1961), Royal Historical Society"