St. Otto of Bamberg, whose feast is observed July 2 in the United States, is also honored in a special way on two local calendars in Europe: June 30 in Germany and July 1 in some dioceses of northwestern Poland.

Historically, Germany and Poland have not been the best of friends, so how is it that St. Otto features on both their calendars? Two big reasons: the investiture controversy in what is now Germany and conversions in today’s Poland.

St. Otto was born sometime around 1060/61, at the height of the investiture controversy. In simplest terms, the investiture controversy involved who could appoint bishops: the pope or civil rulers? Like his 11^th-century contemporary St. Benno (whose feast Germans observed June 16), Otto was caught between pope and king. Otto became bishop of Bamberg in 1102 by imperial decree, but would not accept episcopal consecration from a schismatic bishop; he held off and received consecration in Rome in 1106.

He was careful to balance his loyalties; he received his pallium from the Pope in 1111. The pallium is the woolen band with crosses on it that archbishops wear around their necks as a sign of their communion with the Holy See. This year, Pope Leo XIV returned to the pre-Francis practice of the pope imposing the pallium on new archbishops during the Mass on Sts. Peter and Paul Day in Rome on June 29.

As we can see from the investiture controversy, current-day controversies over government control of bishops are hardly new, though one could hardly imagine in Otto’s day popes negotiating with atheists over who might fill an episcopal office. As bishop, Otto developed his diocese, founding parishes and monasteries throughout what we now call Bavaria. It was he who received Hildegard of Bingen into the Benedictine order.

That’s Otto’s German side. His involvement with Poland was also important.

Poland was baptized as a Christian country in 966 although, obviously, the Christianization of various Slavic tribes would take years. When the sister of Emperor Henry IV married a duke of the first Polish dynasty, the Piasts, Otto accompanied her to Poland as chaplain. That nexus would also establish his place in the German court.

We need to remember that countries we now call “Germany” and “Poland” were nowhere near as united then as today: there were various tribes that inhabited their territories, and not all of them — especially the closer one got to the Baltic coast — had already become Christian. One such group was the Pomeranians. Pomerania is that part of northwest Poland lying near the Baltic, today marked by cities like Szczeciń. The young Polish monarchy was interested in peacefully consolidating its area. An “Italian” or “Spanish” bishop had attempted to convert them, but his austere self led to a mission that failed. (One suspects the Poles looked there first so as not to be overly reliant on the Germans — Otto would later try to make a bishopric in the region subject to the German hierarchy.)

The Poles then turned to Otto, “the Apostle of Pomerania,” who arrived in his noble splendor with an entourage of priests. The Pomeranians, convinced the man was wealthy enough not to want theirs, slowly turned to Christianity. Later, after 1128, Otto made a second major journey to the region to stamp out some pagan customs that refused to die out. He also dispatched priests to give the faith an established presence in that land. One source attributes over 22,000 conversions to his work.

Otto died in 1139 and was already canonized in 1189.

Our saint is depicted in art by this fresco, which may even have been made before Otto died, at the (now secularized) Benedictine monastery at Prüfening near Regensburg in Bavaria. Frescos are paintings done on wet plaster: Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling paintings are frescos.

Otto is depicted as a bishop, relevant not just because he was but because of the centrality of the episcopal office to many controversies of his day. He wears a miter and carries a crozier. The circular band around his neck is the pallium for which he waited four years to receive in Rome; I’m not sure whether the bands extending down are parts of the pallium in its medieval style or his stole. I think it telling he appears to be mobile, moving forward; it was that mobility that carried him across Pomerania. That the fresco is in a monastery is also telling, given the number of monasteries whose foundation was owed to his efforts.

[For more reading, see here and here.]