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  • #928

    [color=darkblue:3gavpqow][b:3gavpqow]The goal of this discussion is to give a fairly good account of how the Catholic faith works.[/b:3gavpqow][/color:3gavpqow]
    Please contribute what you can and often. It would be great to get a lot of people involved in this project.

    So…where to start –

    The Catholic faith starts with a belief in God. It’s a foundational belief that you either accept or reject. It’s not possible entirely to prove God exists, nor is it possible entirely to disprove God exists.

    #3512
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    I would like to add at the very beginning that faith itself is a gift of God.

    #3531
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    I would like to add that every person has a choice to make:

    [i:2dafbsf1]Is there a God?[/i:2dafbsf1]

    A huge majority of the world agrees there is a God. So then a person is lead to another question:

    [i:2dafbsf1]Who is this God and how do we know about him?[/i:2dafbsf1]

    because there are many who claim they know ‘God’ or worship ‘gods’ or my God is right and your’s is wrong.

    Any ideas?

    #3538

    [quote:1up4tdlm][i:1up4tdlm]Who is this God and how do we know about him?[/i:1up4tdlm]

    Any ideas?[/quote:1up4tdlm]
    This is the route I was going to go next (and still am).

    It is impossible to adequately describe God with human terms but we can do the best we can with what has been revealed to us over history and in the Scriptures (Bible).

    God is just, merciful, loving, creator, father, son, holy spirit, omniscient, omnipresent, mighty, … [please feel free to add]

    #3588
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    God is a consuming Fire (hebrews12:29)
    God is a Word (John1:1)
    God is a Spirit (John 4:24)
    God is Love (1John 4:16)

    Where is heaven then??
    The Kingdom of God is within you(luke17:21)

    also found in Gospel of Thomas verse 3
    (Apocryphal, Or Deuterocanonical Books)

    #3595
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Apocryphal and deuterocanonical are not the same, although many term the deuterocanonical books apocryphal.

    Apocrypha – Books that are not part of the canon. Not Scripture.

    Deuterocanon – Books that part of the canon but, at one point, were disputed. Scripture.

    The Gospel of Thomas is Apocrypha. Sirach is Deuterocanonical.

    Deuterocanonical can be thought of in the same sense as Deuteronomy (second law). Deuteronomy is Law but came later (second). The Deuterocanon is Scripture but received full acceptance later (second).

    #3642

    Going back to this question:
    [quote:3dhjsy3i][i:3dhjsy3i]Who is this God and how do we know about him?[/i:3dhjsy3i][/quote:3dhjsy3i]
    I don’t think it was fully addressed.

    We already talked a little bit about what God is like using adjectives to describe him. But how does one come to a sense of God or how do we know about God in the first place?

    God has revealed himself to us in many ways.
    [b:3dhjsy3i] ¬? [/b:3dhjsy3i]Human experience
    [b:3dhjsy3i] ¬? [/b:3dhjsy3i]Scriptures
    [b:3dhjsy3i] ¬? [/b:3dhjsy3i]his Creation
    We know God because he has directly spoken with some of our ancestors in faith. Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Mary, Peter and all the Apostles. God became a human being and walked and talked with us.

    We have a good record of those experiences in our Scriptures. The Scriptures are a written account of the human experience of God. God’s word is also the Scriptures.

    God also reveals himself to us in his wonderful creation and in the order of the universe. We know there is a God because of the order in the universe.

    #7955
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    [color=darkblue:1q3nxx6g]God is Everlasting, Truth itself, Forgiving, Compassionate, Humble, Meek, and Gracious, to name a very few. [/color:1q3nxx6g]

    #8517
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Personal favorite from Pope John Paul II . .
    “God in His deepest mystery is not a solitude, but a family, since He has in Himself fatherhood, sonship, and the essence of the family, which is love…”

    #8518
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    [quote:17txhube]I would like to add that every person has a choice to make:

    [i:17txhube]Is there a God?[/i:17txhube][/quote:17txhube]

    I believe there is a God/Creator because to believe otherwise is not logical.
    There are only two choices for what existed at the very beginning. There was either nothing or there was something. If there was “nothing” then we would still have nothing now, because we all know something cannot come from “nothing”. So we are left with one choice that makes sense. We had something that caused or created everything else.

    Here are other proofs that are based on what St. Thomas Aquinas said:
    1) Newton’s first law states, “an object at rest will remain at rest unless acted upon by an outside force.” . A book that you place on a table will not move unless some force moves it, such as your hand. In order for something to have force it has to have acceleration, which means it has to be a moving object (F=ma). What this means is nothing moves by itself but needs a moving object to move it.
    Now when you look at the earth and ask what put it in motion-a scientist might say A put the earth in motion. Then you ask what moved A-the scientist answers B moved A. So again you ask what gave B movement to move A and the scientist says C and so on till you get to the end and at the end you will find the last thing, lets call it Z. The question now is who moved Z and no scientist will be able to tell you. Can Z have moved on its own? Not according to science. That would lead you to the conclusion that there had to be a first mover, which we call God.

    2) There is nothing in life that causes itself. If something caused itself then it existed prior to its own existence, which is an absurdity and an impossibility. So if you take anything lets say a bean plant, and ask “what caused it ?” You will be answered that a seed caused it . Ask what caused the seed and you will be answered another bean plant from last year. If you keep going back to the very first bean plant and ask where did that plant come from and no scientist will be able to tell you. Can the first bean plant have caused itself and appeared on its own? Impossible.That would lead you to the conclusion that a first cause had caused this plant that first cause we call God.

    3) Nothing without intelligence can direct itself in an intelligent manner to a good end. A basketball cannot by itself go into the hoop. A human with intelligence has to direct it to go into the hoop. If you look at creation, you will see that there is so much intelligence in unintelligent creation that it is an impossibility that everything is directing itself. For instance: how do trees know that they should grow buds in spring-the answer is length of daylight. Then you ask who told the plant that it should go by length of day? The answer is the genes (DNA). Who told the genes to be formed in such a manner as to take the length of day into account? You could stop here and say an intelligence outside the plant or if you keep going on to more causes at the end you will find no more causes except some intelligence which we call God.

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