29 "Into thy hands I commend my spirit": we salute the eleventh centenary of Saint Methodius' death with the very words which as his Life in Old Slavonic recounts he uttered before he died, when he was about to join his fathers in faith, hope and charity: the Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, Doctors and Martyrs. By the testimony of his words and life, sustained by the charism of the Spirit, he gave an example of a vocation fruitful not only for the century in which he lived but also for the centuries which followed, and in a special way for our own times. His blessed "passing" in the spring of the year 885 after the Incarnation of Christ (and according to the Byzantine calculation of time, in the year 6393 since the creation of the world took place at a time when disquieting clouds were gathering above Constantinople and hostile tensions were increasingly threatening the peace and life of the nations, and even threatening the sacred bonds of Christian brotherhood and communion linking the Churches of the East and West. In his Cathedral, filled with the faithful of different races, the disciples of Saint Methodius paid solemn homage to their dead pastor for the message of salvation, peace and reconciliation which he had brought and to which he had devoted his life: "They celebrated a sacred office in Latin, Greek and Slavonic", adoring God and venerating the first Archbishop of the Church which he established among the Slavs, to whom he and his brother had proclaimed the Gospel in their own language. This Church grew even stronger when through the explicit consent of the Pope it received a native hierarchy, rooted in the apostolic succession and remaining in unity of faith and love both with the Church of Rome and with that of Constantinople, from which the Slav mission had begun. Now that eleven centuries have passed since his death, I desire to be present at least spiritually in Velehrad, where-it seems-Providence enabled Methodius to end his apostolic life: -I desire also to pause in the Basilica of Saint Clement in Rome, in the place where Saint Cyril was buried; -and at the Tombs of both these Brothers, the Apostles of the Slavs, I desire to recommend to the Most Blessed Trinity their spiritual heritage with a special prayer.
Source: Slavorum Apostoli (Vatican.va)