METHODIUS, Saint. - Byzantine patriarch, b. in the second half of the 8th century at Syracuse, d. at Constantinople on 14 June 847. Educated in his native city and later at the court of Constantinople, he entered a monastery there. A defender of the veneration of the holy images, he went in 815 to Rome, where he remained for seven years. Having returned to Constantinople after the death of the iconoclast emperor Leo V the Armenian, he suffered for the faith also under the emperors Michael II and Theophilus, until after the death of the latter he was recalled by the iconophile empress Theodora and designated patriarch of Constantinople. M. re-established in the Synod of 843 the veneration of the holy images according to the norms of the Seventh Ecumenical Council of Nicaea (787) and instituted in memory of this victory the "Feast of Orthodoxy."
His patriarchate was hindered by the dissension of the Studites, who were too rigorous in the reconciliation of clergy who had formerly been iconoclasts and in the question concerning the memory of the husband of the empress Theodora; on the other hand the patriarch seems to have been too severe against these monks and particularly against the writings of St. Theodore Studites (who had already died in 826). It appears, however, that before the patriarch's death peace was restored between him and the monks. M. is the author of apologetic, hagiographic, liturgical, canonical writings and of poems. Pope Nicholas I gave a fine eulogy of him (PL 119, 946 D); he is venerated as a saint in the Roman and Greek Church. Feast on 14 June.
Bibliography2 works
Giorgio Hofmann