This page was added
Oct. 3, 2003
Homily 21 September 2003
By Fr. Hathaway FSSP
Mater Dei Latin Mass Community

Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost
I Believe in God, Part 2


Last week we spoke on what it means to say, “I believe” then presented  St. Thomas’s five arguments whereby man, unaided by divine revelation, may grasp that God exists. 

Today, we will speak on what we know of the Divine Nature aided by divine revelation (and St. John Newmann’s Catechism.)

God is the Supreme Being, an infinitely perfect Spirit; Creator and Lord of heaven and earth.  God is a spirit because He has no body, but does have an understanding and a will; God is infinitely perfect because He possesses all manner of perfections without limit.

What are some perfections of God?
God is eternal, everywhere present, almighty, all knowing, all wise; He is all holy, just, and good; He is all merciful, true, faithful.

Suppose we go to some scripture references to see more closely these perfections of God. 
In the first verse of the book of Genesis, we read, “In the beginning God created heaven and earth.”(Gn 1:1).  In this passage, three words deserve special attention: God, created, in the beginning.

The Hebrew word for God is ‘Elohim’ which describes a Being both majestic and almighty.  Moreover, “Elohim,” by its ‘im’ plural ending, may also be read as “gods” as used to describe the gods of the heathens in Ps 95:5, “all the gods of the Gentiles are devils, but the Lord made the heavens.”  The Hebrew verb for created, ‘bara’ is in the third person singular and reads “he created” to reveal the action belongs to one; bara itself means, ‘bringing into existence from nothing.”  And what was brought into existence from nothing: heaven (space) and earth (matter.)  The final phrase, ‘In the beginning,’ bereshith’ in the Hebrew, denotes the creation of time.

So in this brief passage we discover that God is a Supreme Being.  God is eternal for He predates all creation, including time; God is everywhere present for He necessarily must be in the space He creates; God is almighty for He creates everything from nothing; God is all-wise and all-knowing for His creation is not chaos but wonderfully ordered... and, as God is the cause of creation, it can be said He knows it better than it knows itself... He knows it inside and out.

In another scripture, chapter 3 of the Book of Exodus, God tells Moses His name when He commissions Moses to free the Israelites from slavery to the Egyptians. 

Recall that after Moses kills an Egyptian, he flees Egypt and settles in the land of the Midianites where he marries the daughter of the chief priest.  One day, while tending the sheep of his father-in-law atop Mount Horeb, the Lord speaks to Him from a burning bush - a bush which burns without being destroyed - “Moses, Moses... come not hither, put off thy shoes from thy feet for the place wherein thou stand is holy ground... I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob.”  Moses then hides his face for he dared not look at God.

In their ensuing conversation, God tells Moses that He wishes to rescue His people from their affliction and promises to bring them to a beautiful land - a land flowing with milk and honey - and Moses is His instrument.  Moses is cautious, “who shall I say hath sent me?”  God responds, “I Am who Am.  Thus shall you say to the children of Israel, ‘He Who Is hath sent me to you.’”
 God is He Who Is; God is Being itself.  Put another way, God alone is Being while everything else has being.  The essence of God, what God is in Himself, is existence; God cannot not be. 

The rest of Exodus recounts how Moses, following God’s instructions, frees the Israelites, leads them through the desert for 40 years, before finally dying right before the Promised Land is obtained.  It is a history invested with numerous accounts of God holiness, justice, goodness; His mercy,  truthfulness and faithfulness.

By saying God is holy we mean God loves and wills only what is good; He hates what is evil.  God loves Himself in His perfections and He loves creatures in proportion to the perfections they possess; that is why God loves Mary most of all creatures.  Even angels are not pure in His site (Job 4:18); they are as candles to the sun.  Holiness regards perfection in moral goodness.  God wants us to be holy.  “If I have looked at iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me.” (Ps 65:18)

By saying God is just we mean He rewards the good and punishes the wicked as they deserve. 
“The wicked shall be turned into hell with all the nations that forget God.” (Ps 9:18)

By saying God is good we mean He is infinitely good in Himself and infinitely good to His creatures. 
The more perfect a thing is the more good it is; as God is perfect so is He the ultimate good of man.  This goodness in God we praise and brings us to heaven.  “Give glory to the Lord for He is good for His mercy endures forever.” (Ps 105:1); “Thy good spirit shall lead me into the right land.” (Ps 142:10)

By saying God is merciful we mean He pardons the sinner who repents of his crime and receives Him once more into His friendship.
Mercy is the removal of deserved punishment.  God is merciful and He will forgive us our sins if we repent.  “I will confess against myself my injustice to the Lord; and Thou hast forgiven the wickedness of my sin.” (Ps 31:4)

By saying God is true we mean He is incapable of telling a lie; God can not deceive nor be deceived.
“God is not as a man that He should lie, nor as a son of man that He should be changed.” (Nu 23:19); “Thou, O Lord, art a God of compassion, of much mercy, and true.” (Ps 85:15)

By saying God is faithful we mean He keeps His promises and executes His threats.
“The word of the Lord is right and all His works are done with faithfulness.”  (Ps 32:5)

In summary, God is the supremely perfect Being.  God can not change; He is immutable.  God is the same always; today, yesterday, forever... the same God.   He does not change location; He can not forget what he knows; He does not grow older.  Change implies becoming more or less -  worse or better - which is impossible for infinitely perfect Being.  If God could change He would not be God for that would mean He is not perfect but at some level of perfection.

And lest we forget, this infinitely Supreme Being who is almighty, all knowing, just and holy, is the same God whom we will shortly receive in the most Blessed Sacrament of the altar.  Moses hid his face rather than look upon God in the burning bush; after Moses converses intimately with God his face beams with a radiance and the Israelites ask he wear a veil so to not frighten them. Would that our communions could cause us to shine with such a radiance as to convert the world!




Return to Main Menu                               Return to Homilies Index