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Saint Willigis (died February 23, 1011), Archbishop of Mainz, was a model bishop of the 10th century, a statesman as well as a churchman.
The able and intelligent son of a wheelwright, Willigis received a good education, and was recommended by Bishop Volkold of Meissen to the service of Otto I, Holy Roman Emperor. From 971 Willigis served as chancellor to the Emperor. Emperor Otto II in 975 made him Archbishop of Mainz and Archchancellor of the Empire.
Willigis demanded solid learning in his clergy too.. He was known as a good and fluent speaker. In March, 975, he received the pallium from Pope Benedict VII and as Primate of Germany, at Christmas, 983, he crowned Otto III, Holy Roman Emperor at Aachen, and in June, 1002, crowned Henry II at Mainz.
Willigis presided at the Synod of Frankfort, 1007, at which thirty-five bishops signed the Bull of John XVIII for the erection of the Diocese of Bamberg. He stood in friendly relations with Rome, though the Papacy stood at its nadir. In 996 he was in the retinue of Otto III on his journey to Italy, assisted at the consecration of Pope Gregory V and at the synod convened a few days later. In this synod Willigis strongly urged the return of St. Adalbert to Prague. Willigis had probably consecrated the first bishop of Prague, Thietmar (January, 976), at Brumath in Alsace, and had consecrated Adalbert. The latter, unable to bear the conflicts within his see, left his diocese and was, after much correspondence between the Holy See and Willigis, forced to return.
In 997 Gregory V sent the decrees of a synod of Pavia to Willigis, "his vicar", for publication.
These friendly relations were somewhat disturbed by the dispute of Willigis with the Bishop of Hildesheim about jurisdiction in the convent at Gundersheim. The convent was originally situated at Brunshausen in the Diocese of Hildesheim, but was transferred to Gundersheim, within the territorial limits of Mainz. Both bishops claimed jurisdiction, but when Pope Silvester declared in favour of Hildesheim, to Willigis' initial resistance.
In his diocese he laboured by building bridges, constructing roads, and fostering commerce. In Mainz he built a cathedral and consecrated it on 29 Aug., 1009, in honour of St. Martin, but on the same day, disastrously, it was destroyed by fire; he greatly helped the restoration of the old Church of St. Victor and built that of St. Stephen. He also built a church at Brunnen, in Nassau. He showed great solicitude for the religious, and substantially aided the monasteries of Bleidenstadt, St. Disibod, and Jechaburg in Thuringia. After death he was buried in the Church of St. Stephen.
His protegé was the scholarly and just Burchard, bishop of Worms.
Roman Catholics celebrate his feast, February 23.
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