Julius Defends Athanasius

The bishops of Egypt sent a written declaration that these charges were false. And Julius, learning that Athanasius was far from safe in Egypt, sent for him to come to his own city. At the same time he replied to the letter of the bishops who had met at Antioch, for he happened to have just received it. He accused them of having secretly brought in innovations against the doctrines of the Nicene council, and of having broken the laws of the church by failing to invite him to their synod; for he maintained that there is a priestly canon declaring that whatever is enacted against the judgment of the bishop of Rome is null. He also reproached them for having departed from justice in all their proceedings against Athanasius, both at Tyre and at the Mareotis. He stated that the decrees passed at Tyre had been annulled because of the slander about the hand of Arsenius, and those passed at the Mareotis because Athanasius had not been present. Last of all he rebuked the arrogant tone of their letter. [a]

For all these reasons Julius took up the defense of Athanasius and of Paul. Paul had arrived in Italy not long before and had bitterly lamented these misfortunes. When Julius saw that what he had written to those who held the priestly office in the East was of no use, he made the matter known to the emperor Constans. So Constans wrote to his brother Constantius, asking him to send some of the bishops of the East to give the reason for the sentences of deposition they had passed. Three bishops were chosen for this purpose: Narcissus, bishop of Irenopolis in Cilicia; Theodore, bishop of Heraclea in Thrace; and Mark, bishop of Arethusa in Syria. On their arrival in Italy they tried to justify what they had done and to persuade the emperor that the sentence of the Eastern synod was just. When they were asked to produce a statement of their belief, they hid the statement they had drawn up at Antioch and presented another written confession, which was just as much at odds with the doctrines approved at Nicaea. Constans saw that they had unjustly trapped both Paul and Athanasius, and had cut them off from communion not because of any charge against their conduct, as the sentences of deposition claimed, but simply because of differences in doctrine. So he sent the delegation away without giving any credit to the claims they had come to make. [d]