In 634, Pope Honorius I. conferred on Archbishop Honorius, seven years after his consecration, the primacy of all Britain.[57] But there is no evidence to show that the Celtic bishops acquiesced in this power of metropolitan over all England conferred by the Pope on the Archbishop of Canterbury. It was therefore an arbitrary assumption of ecclesiastical authority exercised by the Pope of Rome over the Anglo-Saxon Church, simply because a Roman mission was sent to Christianize the Saxon heathen. But other missionaries were at work in the same field, who were quite unconnected with Rome or its bishop. The time of keeping Easter was the terrible stumbling-block in the way of a union between the Roman and Celtic missionaries. In A.D. 664, a synod was held at Streaneshalch; the subject of the proper time of keeping Easter was discussed in the presence of King Oswy of Northumberland by Bishop Colman and Wilfrid. In the same year Deusdedit, Archbishop of Canterbury, died. The result was that the king espoused the Roman style.[58] Then followed an interregnum of four years. Wilfrid’s strong opinions about Easter kept him out of the archiepiscopate. It is vitally important to note this turn of the tide to Rome. I take all particulars from Bede’s Ecclesiastical History. If this turn had not occurred there would have been two separate and independent Churches in England, the Celtic and the Roman. In 664 a synod was convened in the monastery of Streaneshalch (Whitby) presided over by King Oswy, who was at first a follower of the Celtic ritual, for the discussion of the proper time for keeping Easter. Bishop Colman spoke for the Celtic Church; Priest Wilfrid for the Roman time. The latter had previously gone to Rome to learn the ecclesiastical doctrine. Colman traced the Celtic time to the teaching of St. John the Evangelist; Wilfrid traced his to St. Peter, and then quoted, “Thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build My Church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it; and to thee I will give the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven.” This quotation turned the scales, as will be seen from what followed. “Is it true, Colman,” said the King, “that these words were spoken to Peter by our Lord?” “It is true, O King!” “Can you show,” said the King, “any such power given to your Columba?” Colman answered “None.” “Then,” added the King, “do you both agree that these words were principally directed to Peter, and that the keys of heaven were given to him by our Lord?” They both answered, “We do.” Then the King concluded, “And I also say unto you that he is the door-keeper, whom I will not contradict, but will, as far as I know and am able in all things, obey his decrees, lest when I come to the gates of the Kingdom of Heaven, there should be none to open them, he being my adversary who is proved to have the keys.” The King having said this, all present resolved to conform to the Roman ritual.[59] This was not the first nor the last