There followed a period of misfortune and adventure in small sailing ships. A sea voyage in those days was fraught with peril, for methods of navigation were extremely primitive, time and distance were calculated by the position of the sun and stars, and travellers were not only exposed to hazards of wind and weather, but were at the mercy of pirates who waylaid them as they made their slow and cautious progress round the coasts.

As his ship passed through the islands of the Ionian Sea, it was captured by pirates, and all on board were taken to Crete as prisoners and there became slaves. For many years Joseph lived in servitude, but even as a slave he pursued his active ministry and converted many in Crete to the Christian faith.

Finally, regaining his liberty, he resumed his journey to Rome, where he was received with great kindness, and afterwards returned to Constantinople. The rest of his life was lived in retreat and was mainly devoted to the writing of hymns, so that he became known as Joseph the Hymnographer. Among them was one which vividly describes his experiences at sea:

Safe home, safe home in port!

Rent cordage, shattered deck,

Torn sails, provisions short,

And only not a wreck.

When we sing those words we can remember that they came from the heart of a man who had known storm and shipwreck, and that they reflect his own bitter suffering.

In another of his hymns, "O happy band of pilgrims," we also catch echoes of his stormy pilgrimage: of the trials and sorrows which he had known as a slave and an exile, and pointing to the greater agony of "the Cross that Jesus carried."

Even in those last years, however, Joseph was not to be left in peace. There came a day when once again he was called upon the suffer for Christ, this time to die as a martyr. But, before the end, he shared in a great missionary enterprise, for during his time in Constantinople he was among those who inspired the first missionaries to Russia.

I'm not absolutely sure that Joseph the Hymnographer is identical to Joseph of the Studium who is also celebrated on this day. The dates are approximately the same. Joseph the Hymnographer was the bishop of Salonika and the brother of Theodore Studites. Both are cited as great liturgical poets (Benedictines, Encyclopedia, Gill).

Although he was born in a time when many in the Eastern Church were iconoclasts, Methodius courageously defended the attempt of Christian artists to inspire the faithful by means of beautiful icons. The saint was educated in Syracuse. Then he went to Constantinople intending to be a courtier of the emperor, but a holy monk so much impressed him that he decided to retire from the world. He built a monastery on the Greek island of Chios (Khios), intending to stay there for the rest of his life. But the patriarch of Constantinople, Saint Nicephorus, wanted Methodius by his side. Both men boldly stood up against the destroyers of icons, but Nicephorus was deposed and sent into exile by Emperor Leo the Armenian.

Methodius, too, was forced to flee. He was sent to Rome where to report to Pope Saint Paschal I on the destruction of sacred images. In 821, when Michael the Stammerer was enthroned, Methodius returned to Constantinople with a letter from the Pope Paschal demanding the reinstatement of Nicephorus. Instead the emperor condemned Methodius as a seditionist and ordered that he be scourged and exiled.

For seven years he was kept in a tomb or mausoleum with three thieves. One died and his corpse was left to rot in the dungeon alongside the three living prisoners. When Methodius was released, we are told that he looked like a skeleton, but his spirit was unbroken. He resumed his opposition to iconoclasm under Emperor Theophilus, and was called before the emperor. Blamed for his past activities and for the letter that he supposedly incited the pope to write, he replied boldly, "If an image is so worthless in your eyes, how is it that when you condemn the images of Christ you do not condemn the veneration paid to representations of yourself? Far from doing so, you are continually causing them to be multiplied."

There was a respite for a time when Theophilus died in 842 and his widow Theodora took control of the empire as regent for her small son, Michael III. Happily, she supported those who defended icons and repealed all decrees against images. Within 30 days exiled clergy were recalled and images restored to the churches amid rejoicing. In 843, Methodius became patriarch of Constantinople, replacing the iconoclast John the Grammarian.

He had five more years to live. Speedily he summoned a synod in Constantinople that endorsed the decrees of the Second Council of Nicaea declaring icons lawful in the church. An annual 'feast of Orthodoxy,' still observed in the Byzantine Church on the first Sunday of Lent, was instituted to mark this victory for reason and devotion. The patriarch also translated the relics of his predecessor, Nicephorus, to Constantinople. Unfortunately, this period of reconciliation was marred by a quarrel with some of his most ardent supporters--the monks of Saint Theodore Studites--over some of the abbot's writings. The saint died of dropsy. His immediate successor, Saint Ignatius, instituted an annual celebration of Methodius's feast.

Saint Methodius was said to have been a prolific writer, especially of hymns, though few of his writings still exist. Notable among his extant works is a life of Saint Theophanes. He also authored penitential canons, sermons, and an encomium of Saint Dionysius the Areopagite, which some think incorporates the work of Hilduin that he may have seen during his time in Rome (Attwater, Benedictines, Bentley, Delaney, Encyclopedia, Husenbeth, Walsh).

In art, Saint Methodius is a Greek patriarch holding two candlesticks, one three-branched, one two-branched, or holding a picture of the Last Judgement (Roeder).