Chapter 5 – I Believe in God the Father, the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth

I believe in God the Father Almighty  Our profession of faith begins with God, for God is the First and the Last, 1 the beginning and the end of everything. The Credo begins with God the Father, for the Father is the first divine person of the Most Holy Trinity; our Creed begins with the creation of heaven and earth, for creation is the beginning and the foundation of all God’s works. CC 198

 God is:  One Eternal  Truth Immense  All- Good Immutable  All Beauty Omnipresent  God is Love CCC Following from the proofs for the existence of God we can arrive at characteristics of God:

The confession of God's oneness, which has its roots in the divine revelation of the Old Covenant, God is unique; there is only one God. The Christian faith confesses that God is one in nature, substance and essence. CCC , I BELIEVE IN ONE GOD

God has revealed himself “I am who am”  God is the fullness of Being and of every perfection, without origin and without end. All creatures receive all that they are and have from him; but he alone is his very being; he is of himself everything that he is.  God is a transcendent – Subsisting Being, beyond our capacity of understanding  “YHWH –“I am He Who Is”,“I am who am” “I am Who I am” CCC

If there is only one God, then what is meant by the Blessed Trinity? The mystery of the Holy Trinity is the central mystery of Christian faith and life It is the most fundamental and essential teaching of the hierarchy of faith It is the mystery of God’s hidden life of the family of God CCC 234

The Blessed Trinity is one and the same God in three divine Persons.  First Person - God the Father = Creator  Second Person - God the Son = Redeemer  Third Person - God the Holy Spirit = Sancifier  God is One God in three divine persons  Nature is WHAT we are = GOD  Person is WHO we are,  A person discloses himself in his actions, A person cannot exist without a nature but not every nature is a person. Only relational beings are persons

All three Persons are one God, but each is distinct in relation to one another The Father is Creator and eternally Father by his relation to the Son, his Word The Son is consubstantial with the Father and proceeds from the Father by generation, begotten, not made. The Holy Spirit proceeds from the love of the Father and the Son by spiration, (filioque) The do not share the divine nature, they each possess it entirely, one intellect/one will. CCC Trinity = Three persons, distinct but not separate.

God’s Immediate Family  Any business will happily accept a check from any of them in payment of a bill.  You can invite the whole family by asking one of them to come to your house and bring the others.  You can borrow money from anyone of them and repay it by giving the amount owed to anyone of them.  Yet you can distinguish between them based on looks or their position in the family.  They are distinct not separate. Here is an example: The Smith family live in one house. Many of us see the family as the single unit and it is.

Water is like the Trinity  Water comes in 3 forms  Liquid  Ice  Gas The Trinity is One, not three Gods, but One God in three divine persons CCC 253, Comp 48

An Egg is like the Trinity  Shell  White  Yoke  Three parts in one egg.  The Trinity is One, The divine persons are really distinct from one another. CCC 254

The Trinity is like the Trinity  The Father  The Son  The Holy Spirit  The divine persons are relative to one another It seems clear that the three-in-one concept is not only found in nature but also in the Bible when it describes the Most Blessed Trinity.

God’s Economy  Theology = the study of God. It refers to the mystery of God’s inmost life within the Trinity  Economy refers to all the works by which God reveals himself and communicates his life  The whole divine economy is the common work of the three divine persons however each divine person performs the common work according to his unique personal properties  CCC 236 & 258

First while the word “Trinity” does not appear in the Bible, there are many references that explain the Trinity.  If we go to Genesis 1: 26 we read: God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness;  Using the word us and our indicate a plurality of persons therefore others existed prior to the creation of man. It seems clear that the Father is creating mankind in concert with the Word of God, his Son. It seems clear that the Spirit of God is also present. So we have Father, Son and Holy Spirit all present in one passage. Creation is a work of the Trinity

Genesis Chapter 1

Creation of the World – the House of God 1 st Day and Night (Time) 2 nd Sky and Sea ( Space) 3 rd Land & Vegetation (Life) 4 th - Sun & Moon rule over 5 th - Birds & Fish rule over 6 th - Animals & Humans rule over 7 th Day = Sabbath Covenant with Creation