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Our father among the saints [[saint]]s '''Ansgar''', [[Apostle ]] of the North and [[Enlightener ]] of Denmark (also '''Anskar''' or '''Oscar'''), ([[September 8]](?), 801 - – [[February 3]], 865) was [[archbishop ]] of Hamburg-Bremen. His [[feast day]] is [[celebrated on the date of his repose, February 3]].

Ansgar was born in Amiens. He had for a period resided with the [[baptism|baptized]] Danish king Harald Klak, and when Louis the Pious at Worms in 829 was requested by two representatives from Sweden and the Swedish king Björn at Hauge, he appointed Ansgar [[missionary]]. The representatives had claimed that the several Swedes were willing to [[conversion|convert ]] to Christianity. Ansgar arrived at Birka in 829, with his aide friar Witmar, and a small congregation was formed in 831, which included the king's own steward Hergeir as the most prominent member. The see of Hamburg was designated a "Mission to bring Christianity to the North," and thus St. Ansgar became known as the ''Apostle of the North''.

He died in 865 in Bremen. His [[hagiography]] was written by his successor as [[archbishop]], Rimbert, in ''Vita Ansgari''.

A statue dedicated to him stands in Hamburg as well as , and a stone cross at Birka.

* [http://www.skolinternetorthodoxengland.teliabtinternet.se/TIS/birka/textengco.uk/histservansg.htm Commemoration of Our Father among the Saints Ansgar at Birka, Archbishop of Bremen & Hamburg, Enlightener of Denmark & the North] Composed by [[Reader]] [[Isaac Lambertson]] - History of Birka* [http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/anskar.html ''Vita Ansgari''], English translation from the ''Internet Medieval sourcebookSourcebook''*[http://www.uni-heidelberg.de/subject/hd/fak7/hist/c1/de/gen/gen/grmnhist/log.started920201/mail-16.html "A Brief History of Saint Anskar, Patron of Germany, Archbishop of Hamburg and Bremen (A.D. 865)"] ''Butler's Lives of Patron Saints''. Edited by Michael Walsh. Harper & Row, Publishers: San Francisco, 1987.*[[Wikipedia:Ansgar|''Ansgar'' at Wikipedia]]