Another Fragment, on the Churches and the Faith

Here begins a letter of Saint Athanasius, bishop of Alexandria, to his children. May God comfort you. I know, moreover, that it is not only this that saddens you, but also the fact that while others have taken the churches by violence, you are meanwhile driven out of your places. For they hold the places, but you hold the apostolic faith. They are, it is true, in the places, but outside the true faith. You are outside the places, indeed, but the faith is within you. Let us consider which is greater, the place or the faith. Clearly the true faith. Who, then, has lost more, and who possesses more: the one who holds the place, or the one who holds the faith? The place is good indeed when the apostolic faith is preached there; it is holy if the Holy One dwells there. (A little further on:) But you are blessed, who are in the church by faith, who dwell on the foundations of the faith, and who have full satisfaction, the highest degree of faith, which remains among you unshaken. For it has come down to you from the apostolic tradition. Accursed envy has often wanted to unsettle it, but has not been able to. On the contrary, it is they who have rather been cut off by their attempts to do so. For this is what is written: “You are the Son of the living God,” as Peter confessed by the Father’s revelation, and was told, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for flesh and blood did not reveal this to you,” but “my Father who is in heaven,” and the rest. No one, then, will ever prevail against your faith, dearly beloved brothers and sisters. For if God ever gives the churches back (and we think he will), still, even without such a restoration of the churches, the faith is enough for us. And so that I may not seem to speak too strongly by speaking without the Scriptures, it is well to bring you to the testimony of the Scriptures. For remember that the temple was indeed at Jerusalem. The temple was not deserted, but foreigners had invaded it. That is why, while the temple stood at Jerusalem, those exiles went down to Babylon by the judgment of God, who was testing them, or rather correcting them, while showing them in their ignorance the punishment that came through bloodthirsty enemies. And the foreigners did hold the place, but they did not know the Lord of the place; and since he neither answered nor spoke, they were abandoned by the truth. What good, then, is the place to them? [a]

For see, those who hold the place are accused by those who love God of making it a den of thieves, and of madly making the holy place a house of trade and a place for conducting their lawsuits, though it was unlawful for them even to enter there. For this, and worse than this, is what we have heard, dearly beloved, from those who have come from there. The more they seem to hold the church, then, the more truly they are cast out. They think they are within the truth, but they are exiles and captives, and gain nothing from having the church alone. For the truth of things is judged … [c]