Athanasius contra mundum: A Saint for a time of confusion

Our saint of the day, Athanasius of Alexandria, was probably born in that city between 296 and 298 A.D., a hub of the Greco-Roman world at that time, culturally, politically, intellectually, and morally. It was in that city that, centuries earlier, Jewish scholars rendered the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek, giving us the Septuagint text, used by all the authors of the New Testament. Athanasius had a stellar education, fluent in both Greek and Coptic—although he admits ignorance of Hebrew.

Patriarch Alexander of that city ordained Athanasius a deacon in 319 and brought him to the Council of Nicea in 325 as his secretary, where his theological expertise was only outshone by his personal courage and integrity. We must recall that it was at that first ecumenical council in history that the Church had to confront the heresy spawned by the priest Arius, whose Christology was not only off-kilter but which had spread like wildfire, causing St. Jerome to declare: “The whole world groaned and marveled to find itself Arian.”

As we rather blithely chant the Nicene Creed every Sunday, we perhaps forget that its “consubstantialis” (from the Greek, “homoousios”) did not trip off the tongues of Christians at the time; indeed, Arius—through his clever modes of catechesis and preaching—had proposed and gained acceptance for a slightly different word, “homOIousios,” not “of the same substance,” but “of a similar substance.”

The two words differ by but one letter, the Greek “iota,” giving us our expression, “It doesn’t make an iota of difference.” Except that it did. Was Jesus of a “similar” substance as the Father or of the “same” substance?

Most of the bishops went into that Council as Arians; it was the indefatigable persistence of Athanasius that changed the course of events. So singular was Athanasius in his position that he was chided by a moniker, “Athanasius contra mundum” (Athanasius against the world). That attempt at dissuasion actually redounded to his glory. As the Venerable Archbishop Fulton Sheen was fond of asserting: “Wrong is wrong, even if everybody is wrong. Right is right, even if nobody is right.”

Five months after the conclusion of Nicea, Patriarch Alexander was on his deathbed, to which he summoned Athanasius to inform him that he wished his deacon to be his successor. Athanasius fled, fearing that the position would cause him untold sorrow but he acquiesced when the bishops of the province—and indeed with the whole People of God crying out, “Give us Athanasius”—called him to that office. Of course, his intuition was correct; in his forty-five years as patriarch, he found himself exiled on no fewer than five occasions. After consecrating one of his priests, Peter II, as his successor, the undaunted and fearless Patriarch gave over his noble soul to his Lord and Master on this date in 373.

Aside from admiring this Doctor of the Church, what applications and conclusions can be drawn from his life and witness?

As a young Anglican clergyman and budding scholar in 1833, the future Cardinal John Henry Newman penned a seminal work–The Arians of the Fourth Century–which ultimately led him into the Catholic Church.

Dr. Newman makes a disturbing observation:

The episcopate, whose action was so prompt and concordant at Nicæa on the rise of Arianism, did not, as a class or order of men, play a good part in the troubles consequent upon the Council; and the laity did. The Catholic people, in the length and breadth of Christendom, were the obstinate champions of Catholic truth, and the bishops were not. Of course there were great and illustrious exceptions; first, Athanasius, Hilary, the Latin Eusebius, and Phœbadius; and after them, Basil, the two Gregories, and Ambrose.

And then, Newman notes:

This is a very remarkable fact: but there is a moral in it. Perhaps it was permitted, in order to impress upon the Church at that very time passing out of her state of persecution to her long temporal ascendancy, the great evangelical lesson, that, not the wise and powerful, but the obscure, the unlearned, and the weak constitute her real strength. It was mainly by the faithful people that Paganism was overthrown; it was by the faithful people, under the lead of Athanasius and the Egyptian bishops, and in some places supported by their Bishops or priests, that the worst of heresies was withstood and stamped out of the sacred territory.

Years later, Newman would make it more precise, which can sound eerily contemporary:

In drawing out this comparison between the conduct of the Catholic Bishops and that of their flocks during the Arian troubles, I must not be understood as intending any conclusion inconsistent with the infallibility of the Ecclesia docens, (that is, the Church when teaching) and with the claim of the Pope and the Bishops to constitute the Church in that aspect. . . . while it is historically true, it is in no sense doctrinally false, that a Pope, as a private doctor, and much more Bishops, when not teaching formally, may err, as we find they did err in the fourth century. . . . and yet they might, in spite of this error, be infallible in their ex cathedrâ decisions.

And, then, this rousing conclusion—again, with a very “present” sound to it:

On the one hand, then, I say, that there was a temporary suspense of the functions of the ‘Ecclesia docens.’ The body of Bishops failed in their confession of the faith. They spoke variously, one against another; there was nothing, after Nicæa, of firm, unvarying, consistent testimony, for nearly sixty years …

Imagine sixty years of continued confusion, even after the Council of Nicea!

Interestingly, this November will mark the sixtieth anniversary of Vatican II’s Lumen Gentium, wherein the Fathers of the Council taught us of the participation of the lay faithful in the priestly, prophetic and kingly roles of Christ in His Church. In other words, just as in the fourth century, the laity passed on Catholic truth, despite weak episcopal leadership, it may well be that in this present moment, the preservation of Catholic truth may depend on informed and committed lay folk, more than on the ordained. This may be particularly so, given the confusion emanating from Rome itself over the past decade.

With that in mind, allow me to share with you a few salient insights of Cardinal Newman on the nature of leadership and reform:

Calculation never made a hero. (Development of Doctrine, chapter 7/2.3 [Supremacy of Faith])

It is plain every great change is effected by the few, not by the many; by the resolute, undaunted, zealous few. (P.S. I 287 [24.4.1831])

A few highly-endowed men will rescue the world for centuries to come. (U.S. 97 [22.1.1832])

Rather, shunning all intemperate words, let us show our light before men by our works. (P.S. I 308 [8.5.1831])

And how about this for a finale?

[The Church] fights and she suffers, in proportion as she plays her part well; and if she is without suffering, it is because she is slumbering. Her doctrines and precepts never can be palatable to the world; and if the world does not persecute, it is because she does not preach. (P.S. V 237 [3.3.1839])

Simply put, gear up for some serious work in defense of the Church in a time which promises to be a mirror image of an earlier era, in which the laity played a critical role. Let’s just make sure that any persecution that may come our way is because the Church is indeed preaching.

Sancte Athanasi, contra mundum, ora pro nobis!

Saint Athanasius, against the world, pray for us!

(Note: This homily was preached on the memorial of St. Athanasius, May 2, 2024, at the Church of the Holy Innocents in New York City.)