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9. The Immutability of God

1. Immutability means changelessness. That God is changeless follows upon his infinity and his absolute actuality. What is changeable is, to that extent, perfectible, and God is absolutely perfect. What is changeable is finite, for change means loss or gain, increase or diminishment, and God is infinite. What is changeable is in the state of potentiality (the state of "can be") and in God there is no potentiality at all; God is not in the state of "can be"; God is. Therefore God is immutable or changeless. This does not mean that God is in a kind of frozen fixity. Changelessness in God is sheer perfection. It means that God is without any lack which a change could fill up, and that God is pure actuality which can suffer no loss by change.

2. God alone is immutable, for only God is infinite and absolutely actual. Every creature is in some way changeable, for a creature is finite or limited, and what is limited can conceivably have its limits extended or contracted. All things other than God are thus marked by potentiality. God who is pure actuality is absolutely changeless.

"Happy is the youth, because he has time before him to do good. "
St Philip Neri

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"It is not God's will that we should abound in spiritual delights, but that in all things we should submit to his holy will."
Blessed Henry Suso

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"Whoever wants to stand alone without the support of a master and guide will be like the tree that stands alone in a field without a proprietor. No matter how much the tree bears, passers-by will pick the fruit before it ripens. "
St John of the Cross, OCD - Doctor of the Church

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