* Read and write notes over the following passages from the Catechism * ¶ 31 * ¶ 35 * ¶ * ¶ 202 * ¶ 206 * ¶ 213 * ¶ *Then, write notes on Ch. 4 in the Handbook - Attributes of God (name and description) - Is God a He? *When finished with both, bring them up to me to look over, then correct your quiz.

Bring Catechisms Tomorrow!

* Our Faith and Reason Journey Does God exist? Attributes of God? Yes = theismMonotheismPantheismDeism Hebrew Scriptures PolytheismNo = atheism Maybe = agnosticism (not a real answer)

* God is. * God is… * “All theology consists in finding out what is meant by the words “He Is”. –Frank Sheed * God is the source of being, or existence, for all things. * Looking at the universe we see that in every creature there is a distinction between its essence and its existence; that there is a difference between what things are and the fact that things are. * Essence=what things are * Existence=that things are (has being) * For God, existence/being must be inseparable from what he is; it must belong to him by nature. * More radically put: God must be identical with the fullness of being. That is what we mean by saying God exists absolutely.

* God is Mystery ¶ 206 “If you understood him, it would not be God.” –St. Augustine Refusal of a name Hidden Ineffable Infinite Revealed Knowable Close to men

* Latin: finis meaning an end or boundary or limit. * God cannot end, have a boundary, be limited, or be finite. In other words, God must be utterly limitless, that is, infinite. * However, since we are finite beings we often get tripped up on questions about God that really only have to do with finite beings. (age, size, place, time, hair color, etc.)

* If God is infinite, can there be many Gods? Obviously not. We have already seen that God must exist without limit. * But if he is without limit, there cannot be more than one God. For if there were, there would have to be some difference between them, and this would involve nonbeing (part that is and part that is not God); the one could not be what or where the other was. * Trinity?

* By saying God is spiritual, we mean that God is not a material being. To be a material being is to be a body of some kind. But a body is always limited and subject to change. * To be subject to change in this way is not to be what one will become. And therefore to be subject to change involves nonbeing. * Since God is spiritual he is also unchangeable or immutable.

* Since God is not material, he is not spatially limited. * God cannot be subject to time. For God is the Creator of everything that changes. * Eternity does not mean everlasting time but is not time at all.

* God cannot be a part of the universe. If he were, he would be limited by other parts of it. * God must be other than his creation. This is what we mean by the transcendence of God. * At the same time God must exist in all things. They cannot be set against him, for then he would be limited by them. This is what we mean by the immanence of God.

* Not Pantheism or Deism * Pantheism – identifies God with material nature (pure immanence) * Deism - makes God remote from creation, as if he could wind it up and let it run on its own. “Watchmaker Analogy” used as a teleological proof (argument from design) but then went a step further. (pure transcendence) * Note how this affirmation of God’s transcendence and immanence avoids the one-sided pitfalls of both pantheism and deism. * In Christianity, God gets his hands dirty.

* Our Faith and Reason Journey Does God exist? Attributes of God? Yes = theismMonotheismPantheismDeism Hebrew Scriptures PolytheismNo = atheism Maybe = agnosticism (not a real answer)

* See the universe and all that has been created. It has an intelligible structure. * Likewise, what is created intelligibly must be created by a being that is intelligent. * Not just that the universe is “smart” but that it shows thought and can be comprehended by us.

* To say that God is omniscient (all-knowing) and omnipotent (all-powerful/almighty) means that there can be no real barriers to God’s knowing and acting. * Omniscient: the knowledge of all that God is and does (no contradictions in his nature) * Omnipotent: the ability to do anything (except to contradict one’s nature, but a contradiction is a nothing so it reverts back to anything) * Nothing is impossible to God.

Is God a He? * Male? * Masculine pronouns: good or bad? * Authority * History * Safeguards: transcendence, illusion of saving ourselves * No feminine attributes?

* Faith: * ¶214 God, “He who is,” revealed himself to Israel as the one “abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. * ¶218 In the course of its history, Israel was able to discover that God had only one reason to reveal himself to them, a single motive for choosing them from among all peoples as his special possession: his sheer gratuitous love. And thanks to the prophets Israel understood that it was again out of love that God never stopped saving them and pardoning their unfaithfulness and sins. * “The kind of love revealed in Jesus is far greater than what we could hope to know from philosophy. That is precisely why Jesus revealed the Father to us. If we could learn all we need to know about God from philosophy, we would have no need of divine revelation.” –p. 34 Handbook

* Reason: * We recognize good and evil. * A thing is good of its kind (and that qualification is important) if it succeeds in being that kind of thing to the fullest. * It is bad if it fails. * God is the source of all being. Therefore God cannot be evil in any way, for whether an evil is moral or physical, it is properly understood in terms of what should be there but is not. * Now there can be no question of failure on the part of the Creator; God is to the fullest. And insofar as goodness is one with perfect being; God is the perfect good. * PROBLEM OF EVIL….