Text 2623, 60 rader
Skriven 2007-06-22 06:58:06 av Marc Lewis (1:396/45)
Ärende: Vatican Information Service - Press Release
===================================================
Hello All!
                This Area is READ ONLY.  Do not post to this area.
                The following press release is Copyrighted by the
                          Vatican Information Service.
                ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
                               VIS-Press releases

ATHANASIUS: PASSIONATE THEOLOGIAN OF THE INCARNATE WORD

VATICAN CITY, JUN 20, 2007 (VIS) - Benedict XVI dedicated his catechesis during
this morning's general audience to the figure of St. Athanasius of Alexandria
(circa 300-373), calling him a "column of the Church," and a "model of
orthodoxy in both East and West." Before the audience, which was held in the
Paul VI Hall, the Pope visited the Vatican Basilica where he greeted faithful
gathered there.

After noting how St. Athanasius' statue was placed by Bernini, alongside
statues of other doctors of the Church (St. John Chrysostom, St. Ambrose and
St. Augustine), around the cathedra of St. Peter in the apse of the Vatican
Basilica, the Pope described the Alexandrian saint as a "passionate theologian
of the incarnation of the 'Logos,' the Word of God," and "the most important
and tenacious adversary of the Arian heresy which then threatened faith in
Christ by minimizing His divinity, in keeping with a recurring historical
tendency which is also evident in various ways today."

Athanasius participated in the Council of Nicaea, when bishops established "the
symbol of faith ... which has remained in the tradition of the various
Christian confessions and in the liturgy as the Nicene-Constantinopolitan
Creed." There it is affirmed that "the Son is 'of one substance' with the
Father, precisely in order to highlight His full divinity which was denied by
the Arians. ... The fundamental idea behind St. Athanasius theological labors
was precisely that God is accessible, ... and that though our communion with
Christ we can truly unite ourselves to God."

Nonetheless, the Arian crisis did not end with the Council of Nicaea "and on
five occasions over a period of 30 years, ... Athanasius [bishop of Alexandria
from 328] was forced to abandon his city, spending 17 years in exile." In this
way, however, "he was able to support and defend in the West ... the Nicene
faith and the ideals of monasticism."

This saint's most famous work "is his treatise 'On the Incantation of the
Word'," in which he affirms that the Word of God "was made man that we might be
made God; and He manifested Himself by a body that we might receive the idea of
the unseen Father; and He endured the insolence of men that we might inherit
immortality."

Athanasius is also the author of meditations upon the Psalms and, above all, of
one of the most popular works of ancient Christian literature, "the 'Life of
St. Anthony,' the biography of St. Anthony Abbot which ... made a great
contribution to the spread of monasticism in East and West."

The life of Athanasius, like that of St. Anthony, the Pope concluded, "shows us
that 'those who draw near to God do not withdraw from men, but rather become
truly close to them'."
AG/ATHANASIUS/...VIS 070620 (470)

SUMMARY

--- MPost/386 v1.21
 * Origin: Sursum Corda! BBS =Meridian, MS= bbs.sursum-corda.com (1:396/45)