This is the starting point of all apologetics. How can I help someone enter the church if they don’t believe a God even exist. If we can get people to see that God does exist then only from there can we start to work on the notion of Jesus and Christianity/Catholicism.
The book “Philosophy, the basics” explains this argument as something had to cause the existence of something else. This author explains, if we go as far back as our mind shall allows us to we would find something or someone that had to start the first cause. The argument against this will be that we assume that there has to be a first cause and that first cause had to have a purpose. It also shows that God must have a first cause as well. The only thing about this was the existence of anything would have to depend on a creator and if God had a creator he wouldn’t be God.
Before we get too much into the first cause, and if it could be God, we must paint a picture of what this God would need or be like. Can this notion of God really be possible. First we will create a list that would define this God, and see if it‘s possible for God to exist. As the book gives them to us, God must be, all loving, all knowing, all powerful and simply exist. Here is where it gets tricky. What does, all loving, all knowing, all powerful and exist mean? Can we even understand these fully sense we are bound to our human knowledge. We will try our best.
I would like to bring to the table a couple other things God might not be able to do. As we believe, God can’t sin sense he is a pure being. That would make sin be stronger then he is, due to the fact that he couldn’t fight off the temptation, and due to the fact that sin weakens us and corrupts our soul. If he is perfect he could not be weakened or corrupted in anyway.
God also cant change. If God could change then he would ether become stronger or weaker, smarter or dumber, or even bigger or smaller. If any of these were true then he wouldn’t be God. Why, because for him to become stronger, smarter or bigger he would had to be at one point weaker, dumber or smaller. Sense God is already perfect and pure he wouldn’t be able to “upgrade” himself to become better sense he is already the strongest, smartest and biggest there can be. As for the other side, if he can become weaker, dumber or smaller then that would mean he was once a stronger, smarter and bigger. Which would make God now imperfect.
Then we must put some basic rules down. This God we are talking about can not contradict himself. Basically this means that God can’t go against what he is or who he is. For example, God can’t create a rock so big that he can’t move it. The argument here is, God can’t do everything. Just as we said before, he can’t contradict himself and these would make him contradictive. Other words, this would make him weak and not be all powerful because if God could create something bigger then himself, then he would not be God. As St. Anselm said, “God is that which nothing greater can be conceived.”
I really enjoy this argument because no matter how far we can think back there has to be something that created something else. As far as our minds allow us to go back in time, we will end up with ether God or a single atom. Some say God created all things. Some say it started from an atom. I would like to say, what put that atom there to begin with? If there was something that created God then whatever that was, would be the true God because that would mean God has something more powerful then himself and would need or depend on something else. Which wouldn’t make him God.
If science tells us, matter can not be created nor destroyed. Then that would bring up an interesting point. As we can see everything is around us today, matter must exist. If you can’t destroy it, then it must had always existed somewhere or within something. Going back to the atom, if matter can’t be created nor destroyed then that would mean, all the matter that is in the universe today would have been crammed into one little single atom at one point. Would this be possible? If it was, there must have been a strong being of some sort to put this together. If this did happened, then did God come first, or the atom? Could that atom put God here, or is it more likely God put the atom here?
If science say as far as we can go back in time is to a single atom, then it would be saying that the atom always was and never had a beginning due to it’s matter cant be created nor destroyed. So in a sense would they be accepting that something or someone had to be without being created? If everything had to have a beginning then we wouldn’t be here, due to depending on something or someone else creating it.
If everything that exist needed a creator including God, then we would be saying God doesn’t exist and nether do we. If God needed a creator then his creator would need a creator, and his creator would need a creator, and so on. Let me rephrase that, if it has a creator then it exist, if it doesn’t have a creator it couldn’t exist. If everything needs a creator then nothing would exist. This would be true only if God himself needed a creator as well. Sense God doesn’t need a creator because we believe he always was, then this would show that God could of created everything without needing a creator for himself.
I say if we ever truly understood the mystery of God not having a beginning then that would only be revealed in heaven. We as humans want to have an answer for everything. We want to know everything. If we knew everything about God, and we understood everything about God. We would basically be putting God “in a box” of understanding him fully, if so then he wouldn’t be God. Cause that would mean our human minds just became equal to Gods mind. So to try and find out the first cause is in a way trying to know and understand creation as God knows it. God is beyond thinking, which we are limited to.
-AVM
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