| Letter of Saint Athanasius to his Flock |
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| Saint Athanasius lived in the fourth centuary and was the Bishop of Alexandria in Egypt for 46 years. Banned from his diocese at least five times, he spent a total of 17 years in exile. The famous convert to the Church, John Henry Cardinal Newman, described him as a "principal instrument after the Apostles by which the sacred truths of Christianity have been convyed and secured to the world." Often referred to as the Champion of Orthodoxy, Saint Athanasius was undoubtedly one o fthe most courageous defenders of the faith in the entire history of the Church. |
| May God console you! ... What saddens you ... is the fact that, others have occupied the Churches by violence, while during this time you are on the outside. It is a fact that they have th epremises --- but you have the Apostolic Faith. They can occupy our Churches, but they are outside the true faith. You remian outside the places of worship, but the faith dwelss within you. Let us consider: What is more important, the place or the faith? The true faith, obviously. Who has lost and who has won in this struggle --- the one who keeps the premises or the one who keeps the faith? True, the premises are good when the Apostolic Faith is preached there; they are holy if everything takes place there in a holy way... You are the ones who are happy: you who remain within the Church by your faith, who hold firmly to the foundations of the faith which has come down to you from Apostolic Tradition. And if an execrable jealousy has tried to shake it on a number of occasions, it has not succeeded. They are the ones who have broken away from it in the present crisis. No one, ever, will prevail against your faith, beloved brothers. And we believe that God will give us our Churches back some day. Thus, the more violently they try to occupy the places of worship, the more they separate themselves from the Church. They claim that they represent the Church; but in reality they are the ones who are expelling themselves from it and going astray. Even if Ctholics faithful to tradition are reduced to a handful, they are the ones who are the true Church of Jesus Christ. (Coll. selecta SS> Eccl. Patrum, Caillau and Guillou Vol. 32 pp. 411-412) |