How do we see God theologically?

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I am a devout Catholic and have been around these parts for a while. I hope this is the right category for this question. I just want to clarify how the Church teaches who God is. My understanding is that God is not another being whose just the biggest and greatest of them all, but God is incomprehensible to us because God is beingness - the ground of being. Am I on the right track theologically? How can you explain how we see God if he is not another being? I just find a lot of atheists seem to think we see God as a big Grandpa in the Sky and insult our understanding of God, but I don’t think that’s even what Catholics believe. Could you explain our understanding of God?
 
I don’t think we can encompass God, but we can say mysterious things, as with Paul "God is love.

God’s greatness extends boundlessly beyond created time and matter, as a universe around a pebble. God’s realities are infinitely beyond human knowledge.
 
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He is eternal pure Spirit. He is love.

Theologians will discuss, argue and debate this until the Parousia. I prefer to keep it simple, as God is the Author of simplicity. Well do I know who thrives on complication.
 
“The actions of every creature are before Him, there is no hiding from His eyes; His gaze stretches from eternity to eternity, and nothing can astonish Him.” [Ecclesiasticus 39:19]
 
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We can not grasp how awesome and incomprehensible God is to our minds. We mistake our conceptions regarding Him as the essence of the reality that they fail to encapsulate. Human Reason cannot make sense of God becoming subject to obedience, humility, selflessness and suffering, in love for His creatures! Thus, while we seek You, we are required to trust as little children.

We can only suspect a flicker of the magnitude of this God through His Creation of a stunningly vast universe containing massive expanding galaxies in an immensity of space. Yet, God of such greatness, You also create the fragile intricacy of tiny insects and the worlds of microscopic lifeforms in their intrinsic perfectiion.
 
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Thanks Trishie I know who God is in my prayer life, I’m not looking for prayers but theology.

I am looking for the apologetics answer, that is, the theological definition. I have a relationship with God, I just want to make sure that when atheists are saying we believe in a Supreme Being I am correct in saying, no that’s not what we believe. God is not a being.

I am very grateful for your responses and the previous poster who said God is love, which is what I often say to my children in discussions.
 
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I have my Catechism in the living room I should crack it open! I just would like to hear from the great minds on here because often what atheists are saying we believe in is not a Catholic understanding of God.
 
Your prayers are absolutely beautiful Trishie. You clearly have such a profound prayer life. Thank you so much for sharing them with me.
 
joyfulandactive said:
I am looking for the apologetics answer, that is, the theological definition.
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Don’t confuse apologetics with theology…they are both very, very, different.

Apologetics is defense of the faith, but theology, honestly is an academic and not necessarily spiritual pursuit; it more the foundation to ponder religion, while apologetics is the application of a particular brand (or brands) of theology.

Theologians ask questions about God, some of them uncomfortable to believers; Apologists defend their already accepted tenets of a given theological view.
 
joyfulandactive said:
… but God is incomprehensible to us because God is beingness …
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St. Thomas Aquinas, the fifth way, in Summa Theologiae
Catechism
202 We firmly believe and confess without reservation that there is only one true God, eternal infinite (immensus) and unchangeable, incomprehensible, almighty and ineffable, the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit; three persons indeed, but one essence, substance or nature entirely simple.8

8 Lateran Council IV: DS 800. [649 A.D., Pope St. Martin I 649-653 A.D.]
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I’m fine with the definition of God from the Profession of Faith.

I don’t know why we need any more theology than that.

Who cares what atheists think? They are not going to be convinced by fancy theology anyway when it comes to the existence of God. What they need is faith. So, we pray for them to get faith.
 
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God is a being, but not a creature.
A creature is created. You and I are creatures.
God is creator.
And first cause.
 
i haven’t watched the full clip, but maybe this can help. I find his answers to some of life’s tough questions very enlightening


God bless
 
joyfulandactive said:
My understanding is that God is not another being whose just the biggest and greatest of them all, but God is incomprehensible to us because God is beingness - the ground of being. Am I on the right track theologically?
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Yes, you are definitely on the right track.
 
“God is that than which nothing greater can be conceived.” - St. Anselm

The Apostle John teaches us that “God is spirit.” He doesn’t have a body or other material characteristics.

Since He loves us unconditionally, He took on flesh and became one of us. The Eternal Logos was incarnate, and dwelt among us as Jesus the Christ.

Don’t let atheists confuse you:
  • They don’t know anything about God, and they don’t know God.
  • You are a beloved daughter or son of the Most High God.
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  • You have become a member of His family at baptism.
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  • A herald of the death and resurrection of the Lord at confirmation.
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  • You are fed with the Bread from Heaven at every Mass.
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Atheists couldn’t shine your boots, theologically. Don’t fall for their LITERAL non-sense!

A fool says in his heart, “there is no God.” Psalm 14:1

Deacon Christopher
 
@joyfulandactive, I have a position like yours, and my experience with atheists elsewhere on the Internet is that they take my position as unorthodox. They accuse me of moving the goalposts, inventing my own point of view not representative of Christianity, and don’t let anything I say sink in in future discussions. They don’t see theology as a school or a science, so the only thing that matters to them is what the masses picture in their head when it comes to God.

When trying to convey God’s reality as transcending our own, such that he’s not a being in our (level of) reality, I’ve used two analogies. The more archaic one is the dreamer (God) and the dream (our reality). The dreamer isn’t actually bodily in the dream. A more contemporary example takes a cue from the “do we live in a computer simulation” question. In this analogy, our reality is like the computer simulation, and God is like the computer on which it runs. You don’t find the computer existing in the simulation it’s running. The reality of the dreamer/computer in these analogies transcends our own reality. They are above it.

People I’ve talked with get what I mean, but again, they just accuse me of being an oddball and then continue to just persist in whatever discussion they were going on before about “regular Christians” and sky-daddy conceptions of God and likening belief in God to believing in fairies or unicorns even though we haven’t seen them and that God should be directly observable in the same way.
 
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We do believe God is the Supreme Being. He is Being itself. Being or existence in God are identified, i.e., God is Being or existence itself. God possesses the fulness of being and the perfections of being to an infinite degree. Whatever exists or has being outside of God is something he created out of nothing. Creatures participate in being and existence but they are not being or existence itself as God is. God is not a supreme being as if there are other supreme beings besides himself. Rather, God is the Supreme Being and the source and cause of all created being.
 
I didn’t phrase this very well, my apologies. What I am trying to say is I want to be able to answer questions and defend the faith (apologetics) by a right understanding of theology. I wanted to make sure what I am saying is correct. Not because I need new definitions or I don’t already believe what the church teaches but to help clarify what the questioner is asking and to give them an answer which is in line with our beliefs. Using religious language can be meaningless to atheists (I used to be one) because they don’t have any experience of church or religion. So I am attempting to use language that we can both understand.
 
I do care what atheists think, as I used to be one until God revealed Himself to me. I also work on my parish’s evangelization committee and am involved in reaching out to people in all contexts. You never know when a question someone asks might be one that draws them closer to God. For example if they have misunderstood who we are saying God is - if they think we see Him as a Grandpa in the Sky next level up of being - rather than all love, then they might be open in a way they weren’t previously. Who knows?

I just feel it is my responsibility to try my best to answer questions in ways people outside any experience of religion can get a hold of and comprehend. My parish priest asked me to do this work and so I am doing what I can to communicate. I know the experience of having no religious background with misunderstandings of what Catholics believe. Of course I also pray a great deal and I would encourage the questioner to read the Catechism if appropriate, but many people are much further away and nowhere near ready to do that yet.

In every age it is our task as Christians to communicate the Good News in ways people can understand.
 
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