Feast of St. Willibrord: dancing procession of Echternach

Echternach - 14 June 2011 - Since the medieval town of Echternach, Luxembourg is the center of the so-called "dancing procession" in honor of St. Willibrord (ca.658 -739). On 'the third day of Pentecost, "many thousands of Catholic pilgrims commemorate the Anglo-Saxon monk who established Christianity in northwest Europe.

The celebrations were inaugurated last night in the basilica by Mgr. Fernand Franck, Archbishop of Luxembourg. Bishop Tebartz-van Elst of Limburg in Germany held a recital. Bishops from across the Benelux, France and Germany were present.

The pilgrimage was happy today, besides sun and a good temperature, there was considerable international interests, both from the participants and the spectators. Since last year, the procession to the Immaterial World Heritage List of UNESCO, which only increases the interest.

The participants of the procession are connected with white handkerchiefs and jump to special marches forward, alternately on their left and right foot. The origin of this use is unknown.

Like other years the procession began and ended in the center of town to the abbey founded in 698 by Willibrord. In the crypt lie the bones in a marble sarcophagus that covers the simple Merovingian coffin.

Willibrord was known as the "apostle of the Frisians' (or 'apostle of the lowlands'), spread out from the Lauwers to Luxembourg and Germany until well into the existing Denmark. Willibrord  was consecrated archbishop of the Frisians in 695 by Pope Sergius I. It was an old Roman fort on the site of the present seat of Utrecht. The St. Willibrord, the patron of the Dutch church province.

Both the Roman Catholic archbishop Wim Eijk as the Old Catholic Archbishop Joris Vercammen, were both present at the procession in Echternach, and are considered (the 71st and 83rd, respectively) successors of Willibrord. Both the Roman Catholic St. Catharine's Cathedral and the Old Catholic Cathedral  of St. Gertrude house relics of St. Willibrord.