The Plea begins by asking that there be no arbitrary punishment for their mere name, but for any actions or crimes that they may have committed. He states that the three main charges against Christians are those of Atheism, cannibalism, and incest.
Christians were accused of atheism because they did not believe in the pagan gods of Rome, but Athenagoras states that Christians actually believe in the one true God, believing in the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Ghost, and the very substance of God. He also glosses over issues that were raising their heads at the time, such as the emergence of modalism ( a belief in the sanctity of Jesus only) and instead presents the broader beliefs that all Christians share.
Romans constantly claimed that Christians were ritualistic and that new converts were taken to a secret meeting where they had to plunge a knife into a pile of flour, but the flour hid a baby within it, and without knowing what they were doing, they would kill the baby with the knife. The convert would then be forced to eat their share of the murdered baby, the Romans claiming that even the most reluctant cannibal would be forced to comply because they would be threatened with being tried for infanticide. They would throw the remainder of the meat to the dogs. The dogs were tied to lamps around the meeting room, and when they jumped towards the meat they would pull the lamps over, and the room would be plunged into darkness; under this cover of darkness, immoral acts would take place.
Athenagoras states that this is obviously nonsense and he turns the tables on his accusers by pointing out how foolish they are to worship statues, and that there is folly in worshipping gods who are known to commit the most immoral of behaviors themselves. Since the Romans also aborted their own unwanted children or left them outside to be raised by strangers; they were also known to engage in incest because the rampant immorality of Roman society meant that incest was occurring between the offspring of different unknown fathers. Athenagoras closes his writing by observing that there was far more morality within the Christian community than in Roman society as a whole.
