Athanasius on Christmas - Part 5

God had not only made humanity out of nothing, but had also graciously bestowed on them His own life by the grace of the Word.

When humanity turned from eternal things to corruptible things by listening to the devil, they became the cause of their own corruption and death.

As I said before, though humanity was naturally subject to corruption (because they were created from nothing, from the dust) - yet because they had been graciously united to God the Word, so they were capable of escaping from their temporary, corruptible nature.

BUT, this all depended on humanity holding onto the beautiful innocence that they were given when they were created.

That is to say, the presence of God the Word with them shielded them even from that natural corruption.

This is what we can read in the Book of Wisdom: "God created humanity to be incorruptible and to be an image of His own eternity; but because of the devil’s envy, death entered into the world."

When this happened, human beings began to die.
Corruption ran riot among humanity and ruled over them even more than was natural! This happened because this was the consequence, the penalty, that God had forewarned them about, if they broke His commandment.

In truth, when humanity broke that commandment, they ended up breaking all boundaries. Having invented wickedness in the beginning and becoming caught up in corruption and death, they kept on going from bad to worse.
Humanity did not stop with just one kind of evil, but continually, as with an insatiable appetite, kept on devising new kinds of sins.

Adulteries and thefts were everywhere, murder and abuse filled the earth, law was disregarded as corruption and injustice ruled.

All kinds of evils were done by all - both individuals and whole communities.

Cities were warring with cities, nations were rising against nations, and the whole earth was torn apart with tribes and battles.

Each nation competed to outdo the others in wickedness.

Even crimes contrary to nature were not unknown, but as the martyr-apostle of Christ, Paul, says: "Their women changed the natural use into that which is against nature; and the men also, leaving the natural use of the woman, flamed out in lust towards each other, perpetrating shameless acts with their own sex, and receiving in their own persons the due recompense of their pervertedness."