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34. The Person of God the Son

1. The name Son is manifestly a personal name in God, not an essential name; that is, it refers to one of the three Persons, and not simply to God in unity. The name Word is also a personal name in God.

2. The name Son and the name Word are proper to the Second Person of the Trinity. The eternal generation or begetting of the Son is likened to the process by which the human intellect generates the concept or mental word. Hence the Word of God is the Person begotten by the Father. It is a personal name for God the Son.

3. God, in knowing himself by one eternal act of the divine intellect, that is, "by his only Word," knows his own essence, his operations, and all things. Hence he knows all creatures. And thus the name Word in God implies a relation with creatures.

"If, devout soul, it is your will to please God and live a life of serenity in this world, unite yourself always and in all things to the divine will. Reflect that all the sins of your past wicked life happened because you wandered from the path of God's will. For the future, embrace God's good pleasure and say to him in every happening: "Yea, Father, for so it hath seemed good in thy sight." "
St Alphonsus de Liguori

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

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"The essence of perfection is to embrace the will of God in all things, prosperous or adverse. In prosperity, even sinners find it easy to unite themselves to the divine will; but it takes saints to unite themselves to God's will when things go wrong and are painful to self-love. Our conduct in such instances is the measure of our love of God."
St Alphonsus de Liguori

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