1. Unit 2: The God Question

2.  Junior Year Religion Course Overview Unit 0: Introductory Materials Unit 1: Epistemology (The Study of Knowledge) Unit 2: The God Question  The Characteristics of God Unit 3: The Christian Understanding of & Response to God  The Characteristics of the Christian God  Faith, Prayer, and Discipleship Unit 4: Moral Reasoning Unit 5: Conscience Formation Unit 6: Contemporary Ethical Issues

3. Unit 2: The God Question

4. Meeting the Living God by William J. O’Malley, S.J. The Third Question: What is God Like? The God of the Philosophers

5.  The Characteristics of God The Human Mind (Mere Christianity, p. 22-26)  Mind  conscious, purpose, preferences  Director  gives instructions The Universe (Mere Christianity, p. 29)  A great artist  good, beauty, order rather than chaos  Merciless and not a friend to man The Law of Human Nature (Mere Christianity, p. 30)  A Power that is intensely interested in right conduct – in fair play, unselfishness (generosity), courage, good faith, honesty, truthfulness

6. The God of the Philosophers  The Characteristics of God The human ability to reason  God is a Mind capable of reasoning (seeing alternatives and choosing among them) The created universe  God is a Creator who works with an ultimate purpose, favors growing and evolving, and allows suffering and death The paradoxical nature of humans  God’s nature is also a paradox

7. The God of the Philosophers  The Characteristics of God Immanence  The idea that God is within, indwelling, and “locked” in the world Transcendence  The idea that God is beyond, apart, in no way boxed within the world Although it might seem like a paradox, God is both immanent (dwells in the world) and transcendent (unbearably distant) all at once and at the same time

8. The God of the Philosophers  The Characteristics of God The paradoxical nature of God as both immanent and transcendent can be better understood with the following analogies:  Science  A Fish  Atoms  Plato’s Allegory of the Cave  Helen Keller

9. The God of the Philosophers

10. Meeting the Living God by William J. O’Malley, S.J. The Third Question: What is God Like? The God of Other Religions

11.  Mere Christianity, Book 2, Chapter 1: The Rival Conceptions of God A Christian does not have to believe that all the other religions are simply wrong all through An atheist must believe that the main point in all the religions of the whole world is simply one huge mistake

12. The God of Other Religions  Pantheism (polytheism); God is only immanent The belief that God animates the universe and that the universe is God and anything you find in the universe is a part of God  god is the sun, god is the moon, god is the tree, god is the rock, god is the mountain  humans worship the sun, the moon, the tree, the rock, and the mountain because each of these things is god The belief that God is beyond good and evil  Judaism/Christianity (monotheism); God is both immanent and transcendent The belief that God invented and made the universe and that the universe is God’s creation (Genesis 1) The belief that God is good and righteous, takes sides, loves love and hates hatred, and desires for us to behave in one way and not in another The belief that God made the universe, but that a great many things have gone wrong with the world that God made and that God insists on our putting them right again

13. The God of Other Religions  Mere Christianity, Book 2, Chapter 2: The Invasion Christianity is a complex religion for a complicated and odd world Christianity is a believable religion because it is not something a person could have guessed or made up

14. The God of Other Religions  Dualism (polytheism) The belief that there are two equal and independent powers (or spirits or gods) at the back of everything, one of them good and the other bad, and that this universe is the battlefield in which they fight out an endless war  Judaism/Christianity (monotheism) The belief that this is a good world that has gone wrong, but still retains the memory of what it ought to have been The belief that the cruelty and injustice found in the universe is the result of forces (the evil one or the devil) and people that have fallen away from God’s goodness The belief that the Dark Power responsible for death, disease, and sin in the universe was created by God, and was good when he was created, and went wrong The belief that the war between good and evil is a civil war or a rebellion, not a war between independent powers

15. The God of Other Religions  Christianity is the story of how the rightful king (Jesus Christ) has landed in enemy (the evil one) occupied territory (the world) to lead a group of people (Christians) in a great campaign of sabotage (self-sacrificing love)

16. The God of Other Religions

17.  Although people have seen God from different angles, different times and cultures, and different preconceptions and biases, there is only one Mind Behind It All  The different ways of thinking about God Polytheism  The belief that there are multiple gods that maintain a high level of immanence and are only slightly transcendent Monotheism  The belief that there is only one supreme god that maintains a high level of transcendence and is sometimes also immanent

18. The God of Other Religions  Polytheism The belief that there are multiple gods that maintain a high level of immanence and are only slightly transcendent  Dualism The belief that there are two equal and independent powers (or spirits or gods) at the back of everything, one of them good and the other bad, and that this universe is the battlefield in which they fight out an endless war Ex. Zoroastrianism  A dualist religion of ancient Persia that split god into two equal and independent powers, one of them good and the other bad  Pantheism The belief that god is all things and therefore there are multiple gods that are completely immanent Ex. African Traditional Religion, native American Traditional Religion, Ancient Religions of the Middle East, Ancient Greek & Roman mythology

19. The God of Other Religions  Monotheism The belief that there is only one supreme god that maintains a high level of transcendence and is sometimes also immanent Ex. Judaism  The monotheistic religion that believes God is fully transcendent and immanent and is binded to the Chosen People of Israel through a Covenant Ex. Deism  The belief that god put the world in motion, but no longer is involved in the world in any way; the belief in a god that is completely transcendent Ex. Islam  The monotheistic transcendent religion that arose around 600 A.D. as the last revelation of the living God; it teaches that God exists from forever and is unquestionably supreme over all

20. The God of Other Religions  Hinduism The complex and diverse religion that originated on the Indian sub-continent whose adherents believe in reincarnation and the possibility of absorption into Brahma or the Oversoul  Buddhism The religion that arose from Hinduism through the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama who believed that humans could achieve Nirvana by following “The Middle Path” of equilibrium and moderation

21. The God of Other Religions