Athanasius was born of Christian parents in Alexandria and educated in theology there. Alexander, bishop of Alexandria, was entertaining his clergy in a house overlooking the sea. He observed a group of children playing on the sands, and was struck by the grave appearance of their game. His attendant clergy went, at his orders, to catch the boys and bring them before the bishop, who taxed them with having played at religious ceremonies. At first, the boys, caught at a mischievous game, denied it. But at last they confessed that they had been imitating the sacrament of Baptism and that one of them had been selected to perform the part of bishop, and that he had duly dipped them in the sea, with all the proper questions, and with the proper invocation. When Alexander found that all the essential forms, which render Baptism valid, had been complied with, he added the consecrating oil of confirmation, to seal the sacrament that had been administered. He was so much struck with the knowledge and gravity of the boy-bishop, that he took him under his charge. This little boy was Athanasius, already showing the seriousness that was to stamp his future life.

From this incident arose the connection of Athanasius with the aged Alexander. He became his archdeacon, the head of that body of deacons whose duty it was to attend upon the bishop.

Athanasius was ordained as a deacon and became secretary to Bishop Alexander in the city in c.318. At the Council of Nicaea in A.D.325, Athanasius was present with his master when the heresy of Arianism was condemned and Arius himself excommunicated. Athanasius was to commit the rest of his life to defending the doctrine of the full divinity of Christ and the eternal authority of the Scriptures against this heresy.

When Alexander died in c.328 Athanasius succeeded him and soon found himself battling against the Arian movement which was strong throughout the Mediterranean world, and especially in the imperial court. Arius was a man of talents and eloquence, who had aspired to the throne of Alexandria, and bitterly resented the election of Athanasius in preference to him. First in private, then openly in his church, Arius began to dispute the truth of the Eternal Godhead of Jesus Christ. The bishop hesitated long before he took action, lest he should seem to be acting out of personal feeling against a rival aspirant to the See. But when one of the priests of Alexandria, condemning his inaction, formed a sect among the orthodox, and presumed to ordain priests, he felt that he could remain inactive no longer. He cited Arius to a synod, and then summoned a council of the African Church to hear his doctrines and to decide upon them. Arius was excommunicated.

Emperor Constantine I was persuaded in A.D.330, by Eusebius of Nicodemia, to require Athanasius to readmit Arius to communion. The intractable bishop refused and a campaign was launched to discredit him. He was brought to trial in Constantinople for various alleged offenses and although cleared of them all, he was then accused of murdering Arsenius, an Arian bishop. The charge was so ridiculous that Athanasius refused even to answer it, but he was called to council in Tyre by the emperor himself in A.D.335. He was found guilty before a hostile court, and although the emperor reversed the decision after speaking with Athanasius, he was later persuaded to uphold the conviction and the bishop was exiled in A.D.336 to Trier in Germany.

After Constantine's death, the next year, Athanasius was recalled, only to be deposed when Eusebius again denounced him to Constantius, the son of Constantine ruling Alexandria. He spent seven years in exile in Rome, and was vindicated by a synod there before Pope Julian I. He returned to Alexandria in A.D.345, after the death of the bishop who had replaced him, to be grudgingly reinstated then almost immediately exiled again by Constantius_, who coerced Pope Liberius. Athanasius lived in the countryside around Alexandria until soldiers attacked his church one night and murdered many of his congregation. Athanasius fled to the protection of the desert monks and lived with them for six years, writing many of his most famous theological works.

Finally, in A.D.361, Constantius' successor, Julian the Apostate, revoked all orders of banishment. Athanasius returned to Alexandria, but had to flee to the desert again when he came into conflict with Julian, who propagated paganism. Julian was killed in A.D.363 and Athanasius was reinstated by his successor Jovian. But Jovian died after a tragically short reign of eight months and Athanasius was once again forced to flee when Emperor Valens exiled all orthodox bishops in A.D.365. At last, four months later, the order was revoked and Athanasius returned to spend the rest of his life overseeing his church, preserving orthodoxy and enjoying the relative tranquillity after seventeen years of fear and five separate periods of exile.

About A.D.373 Athanasius, in Jerusalem, under the holy orthodox bishop Juvenal, was savagely murdered. His body was dragged through the streets, and his flesh cast to the dogs, in the riots occasioned by the Eutychians, under the monk Theodosius, who drove Juvenal from his See, and installed himself in his room. Saint Athanasius died May 2, 373.

The creed which bears his name is not his, but is based upon his teachings, and it remains a central part of western Christian liturgy today. One of the great Greek Doctors of the Church, Athanasius is usually represented in his Episcopal robes standing over a defeated heretic, holding an open book in his hand.