Choose a topic from Part 1:
1. Only God is necessarily eternal. Now, absolutelyspeaking, God could create from eternity, so that creatures shouldexist without a beginning. But God does not need to create frometernity, nor, for that matter, does God need to create at all. Andin creatures we discover no reason for supposing that God hascreated from eternity.
2. By revelation (Gen. 1:1) we know that God's eternal will and decree to create are a will and decree to create in time.For, "In the beginning, God created heaven and earth.. . ." But apart from revelation and our faith, we cannot prove that the world did not always exist; that is, that God did not create from eternity. But we can prove that even a beginningless world is a created world, a caused world. For eternal matter, if it existed, would not be causeless matter; it would still have being by participation and not by necessity.
3. God created in the beginning of time. Time itself came into existence with the creation of things.
"Spiritual persons ought to be equally ready to experience sweetness and consolation in the things of God, or to suffer and keep their ground in drynesses of spirit and devotion, and for as long as God pleases, without their making any complaint about it."
St Philip Neri
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"A single act of uniformity with the divine will suffices to make a saint."
St Alphonsus de Liguori
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"A tree that is cultivated and guarded through the care of its owner produces its fruit at the expected time.
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St John of the Cross, OCD - Doctor of the Church
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