Greetings of the Cardinal President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity
on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the proclamation
of Saints Cyril and Methodius as the co–patrons of Europe
along with Saint Benedict

9 December 2020

 

I would like to express my warmest greetings on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the proclamation of Saints Cyril and Methodius as co–patrons of Europe together with Saint Benedict.

The mission of Saints Cyril and Methodius represents for the Slavic people the discovery of a new awareness of their own culture, in some way the very dawn of their culture through the written language which had just emerged. By putting the spoken language into written form and recording it in alphabetic signs, they passed it on to those from whom they had earlier received it in safekeeping. Thus the Gospel came to be expressed in the written Slavic language.

The brothers from Thessaloniki took their Greek and Byzantine tradition to Velehrad, in Greater Moravia, in the heart of Europe, seeking and ultimately obtaining recognition not only for the liturgical texts in the Slavic language but also for their mission from the Church of Rome.

Saints Cyril and Methodius, who are venerated both in the West and East, are for all of us witnesses of undivided unity at is wellspring, and of the possibility of holding diversity together. May their lives be an inspiration for the paths of unity and may their intercession sustain its fulfilment.

 

Kurt Cardinal Koch
President