Why does God create those humans that He knows will end up in Hell?

[allhers]

Actually I was reading something very similar to this last night on EWTN’s web site and someone had asked one of the experts who I believe was a Priest this very same kind of question and their answer mostly resembeled poster # 2’s answer.
The only pretty big difference was that they said that because God knew what Judas would do, that He used that for His good purposes. Makes sense to me, it even says in the Bible (somewhere) something about God using evil men for His good.
Just because you know how something is going to turn out doesn’t mean you cause it to happen, but you can allow it.

 

[TheOpenTheist]

First, its incorrect to say that “God transcends time” because time is not an entity. When you talk that way you are reifying time. Time is simply a conceptual construct that we use to describe reality in order. Since God has always had a loving relationship within the Trinity, then it follows that existence/sequence/duration/time is not a creation.

Second, contrary to what that priest seemed to have said on EWTN, once God knows the actual future (not as possibilities or probabilities, but what actually is), then God is unable to change it. Otherwise, His knowledge would be false. So, God cannot use foreknowledge of a settled future for providential control to work in the good or bad actions of a person.

So, how is God able to exercise any control over creation??

Here is how He does it. If the future is partly open, then God can use His knowledge of possibilities and probabilites to bring about what He desires. This is called the Open View, since it affirms that the future for God is partly open. Since the future is partly open, God’s knowledge of the future is complete (knowing everything knowable at that time), but this knowledge is not made up of settled realities only since part of the future is unknowable beforehand due to creation’s part in the decision-making process. I highly recommend reading the info about the Open View at the Open Theism Info Site to get a good grasp of the view. It will resolve many questions for you. And feel welcome to e-mail me with specific questions.

 

[hurst]

discerning:

…
So, given all of that… how do you make sense of my question in the subject line? At the time He creates that person, God would be able to foresee all of the choices that he/she would make in their lifetime.

Or even, before He created anything, He saw the whole end of it.

discerning:

To maintain the promise of free will, He would not interfere and would allow him/her to make those choices.

“promise” of free will? I didn’t know there was a promise. If we have a free will, it is not because we were “promised” it. It is because it pleased our Creator to give it. He is the One Who defines what it consists of. In fact, He is the One Who enables each and every choice.

But yes, He gave free will:

Ecclesiasticus 17:7 He set his eye upon their hearts to shew them the greatness of his works: 8 That they might praise the name which he hath sanctified: and glory in his wondrous acts, that they might declare the glorious things of his works.

discerning:

Is that person then doomed to go to Hell? Why would God create him/her if that is what will end up to him/her?

No one is “doomed” as if they had no choice. The fact is that God gives them a choice.

God created them from nonexistence that they might glory in His acts and declare His glorious works. He is not second-guessing them.

He is doing it for His purposes, to show forth His glory. He is not wondering how we might feel if we don’t like Him. He is providing for the purpose for which He created us. If we decide we can provide our own purpose and happiness, then He will not stop us, but He did not create us for our own purpose.

As it turns out, those who decide to pursue their own purpose and happiness are in fact bent on stealing it from God, and so now they are His enemy. God is a great King and fights these enemies. In the end, He shows His glory by rendering due justice against their evil, and judging them by rendering to them according to their works.

Hell is not just a random place of flames. Each enemy is dealt with according to his particular chosen evil.

Thus, God’s purpose is maintained. Whether by justice to the wicked or by glory to the just, He shows forth His glory.

hurst

 

[hurst]

Eric Hyom:

You could ask the same question in a different way.

I didn’t choose to be created, why should I be condemed to hell if
I do not choose to follow God’s ways?

This is an excellent restatement of the complaint.

The fact of the matter is, God created us from nothing. We didn’t have a choice in that part. He effectively conquered our “nothingness”, and as such, is Victor.

Now he clothes and equips us with His property, both earthly and spiritual. What will we do? Serve our Master or not? He is a good Master who wishes to make us His beloved children, but the disobedient vainly hope that nothingness will overcome.

We must do God’s Will because we belong to Him, and so to choose to do any other will is to be a thief, taking what is not ours.

To even desire to make a claim of having anything of one’s own - even spiritually - is to oppose the rights of God and be in league with the devil.

Those who sympathize with the devil and are swayed by his temptations (to reject God) do so because their belief in his arguments correspond to their belief in his power. And their belief in his power is based on their own decision to be using that power in another area of their life such as holding a grudge, taking revenge, or otherwise acting to express hate towards their brother, or any other kind of vice they desired to have.

Hell is so bad because God is good - because only God is good, and those in hell have rejected God.

Worse than the place of hell is the state of those who go there, for they can endure hell more easily than the presence of God, Whom they have chosen to mistrust.

To want to always only follow my own will or ideas will render me incapable of entering heaven.

God separated the light from the darkness and provided for the reward and punishment in advance - a mountain of joy for the upright who will praise Him, but a pit of destruction and despair for those who sin and love darkness.

God is already Victor because He conquered my nothingness when He created me. He now commands me to choose life or death, to willingly love Him or willfully deny Him.

hurst

 

[frail]

cynic:

but it IS the cause of the event in this situation, because he is the creator, so if he creates something knowing what it will do he causes it. He causes the future, he is not just an observer.

Of course He’s not just an observer, but He does not interfere with free will. If I use your logic, then God is the cause of people getting high on cocaine because He created the coca leaf. Or responsible for the thousands of people who die each year from smoking because He created tobacco.

That’s a cop-out. These things happen because people freely choose them.

But you’ve only responded to part of my arguement. What is your rebuttal to 2 Peter 3:9, 1 Tim. 2:4?

 

[Breton]

TheOpenTheist:

First, its incorrect to say that “God transcends time” because time is not an entity. When you talk that way you are reifying time. Time is simply a conceptual construct that we use to describe reality in order. Since God has always had a loving relationship within the Trinity, then it follows that existence/sequence/duration/time is not a creation.

Second, contrary to what that priest seemed to have said on EWTN, once God knows the actual future (not as possibilities or probabilities, but what actually is), then God is unable to change it. Otherwise, His knowledge would be false. So, God cannot use foreknowledge of a settled future for providential control to work in the good or bad actions of a person.

So, how is God able to exercise any control over creation??

Here is how He does it. If the future is partly open, then God can use His knowledge of possibilities and probabilites to bring about what He desires. This is called the Open View, since it affirms that the future for God is partly open. Since the future is partly open, God’s knowledge of the future is complete (knowing everything knowable at that time), but this knowledge is not made up of settled realities only since part of the future is unknowable beforehand due to creation’s part in the decision-making process. I highly recommend reading the info about the Open View at the Open Theism Info Site to get a good grasp of the view. It will resolve many questions for you. And feel welcome to e-mail me with specific questions.

“ONCE God knows…THEN God is unable….” God is not constrained by “once” and “then”, past and future! Every bit of this explanation relies upon and constrains God to, your temporal, “conceptual construct” of time which, by the way, He does transcend. There can be no partly open future for God because there is no future for God. He is beyond time and space. He is the “I am” not the “I was” or the “I will be”. Further, God possess divine, infinite knowledge; He does not rely on probabilities and what-ifs. He certainly does not rely on man for his knowledge of what may be. No, I don’t believe this is “how He does it.” This may be how you need to conceptualize it but this doesn’t sync with an omniscient, omnipotent God. Thank’s for the (name removed by moderator)ut but I think I will steer clear of “open theism”.

 

[vern_humphrey]

cynic:

Predestination and free will cannot coexist, they are a contradiction in terms. If I have true free will then, be definition, I am not predestined.

If God foreknows everything that will occurr, then being the CREATOR of everything, he must have purposed what will occurr. So he has made individuals specifically for the purpose of them going to hell…

Unless some people think that God rolls a cosmic dice each time he makes a new soul and goes “Oh look, this one’s going to hell, too bad but I’ll keep my graces open to him just for the sake of it”. It’s crazy, you cannot argue that God is good or loves us if we are presdestined. Our existence becomes nothing more than a means to glorify God, whether through damnation or salvation. We have no more value than animals, or a rock.

That’s an incorrect understanding. God knows all, but grants us free will. We choose whether we will be saved or not. God’s foreknowledge does not make us choose one way or the other.

 

[cynic]

I’ve attempted to answer why I think foreknowledge and predestination are the same thing. It is in our creation that a foreknowing God ‘makes’ us do this or that, if you believe in a foreknowing God that is. But I know there’s no point in argueing with you vern, you’ll simply repeat the same thing over and over again.

Out of interest I asked my muslim work mate, " do you believe that God already knows every choice we will make?"

His reply : “No, that would make existing pointless”. I can’t help but agree.

 

[migurl]

God exists outside space and time, therefore he looks at our lives as easily as we look thru a book. He doesn’t create people to go to hell, but He creates and can see what choices that person will make. He doesn’t want us to go to hell, but because He chose to create us with free will He wouldn’t not create someone the He knows ends up in hell because that would violate His gift of free will. He creates freely, He will never stop creating, for He is The Creator by nature. If He didn’t create He wouldn’t be performing an action that defines Him as God. If you were a sculptor and you somehow KNEW which of your pieces would be clean and taken care of forever and which ones would be either broken, lost or stuffed in a corner to gather dust, would you only create the ones destined for greatness? Or or would you do what you love and create things you love hoping that those which end up breaking or getting lost will somehow lead to good, say for example inspiring someone, who at the sight of a broken piece, decides to dedicate their lives to collecting your works for the purpose of perseving them?

 

[TheOpenTheist]

Breton claimed without providing a bit of evidence

“ONCE God knows…THEN God is unable….” God is not constrained by “once” and “then”, past and future!

How do you know this to be the case? Apparently you are saying it because you seem to think that it sounds right. Not because what God has revealed to us supports its being the case.

you go on

Every bit of this explanation relies upon and constrains God to, your temporal, “conceptual construct” of time which, by the way, He does transcend.

Evidence?

There can be no partly open future for God because there is no future for God.

If that’s the case, then God has nothing to do with us and our future. Then Jesus is not God, but something less than divine, since Jesus became flesh. He wasn’t flesh. Then He became flesh. Then He died. Then He rose. Then He ascended. And now He is in Heaven still possessing His humanity.

Tell me this. Was God always incarnate? Was God always dead? Was God always “sin” or did He become sin? Was God always on the cross, still on the cross even now? Is God still creating the universe described in Genesis?

you go on

He is beyond time and space.

Evidence? Nowhere is such an idear found anywhere in the Bible. In fact, the Bible reveals the contrary. Are you right and the Bible is wrong?

you said

He is the “I am” not the “I was” or the “I will be”.

Congrats! Finally, an attempt to use some sort of evidence to back up your claims! Its not evidence for God being “timeless” or “beyond time” however. In fact, Scripture directly contradicts your claim! God is the “I was” and “I will be” along with “I am” according to what we read in Revelation

Revelation 1:4 John, to the seven churches which are in Asia: Grace to you and peace from Him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven Spirits who are before His throne,

Revelation 1:8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega, [the] Beginning and [the] End,” says the Lord, “**who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”

Revelation 4:8 [The] four living creatures, each having six wings, were full of eyes around and within. And they do not rest day or night, saying: “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, Who was and is and is to come!”

Revelation 11:17 saying: "We give You thanks, O Lord God Almighty, The One who is and who was and who is to come, Because You have taken Your great power and reigned.

This is one of God’s titles and this title reveals that God existed in the past, the present now and will still exist in the future.

you claimed without providing any evidence

Further, God possess divine, infinite knowledge; He does not rely on probabilities and what-ifs. He certainly does not rely on man for his knowledge of what may be.

According to Scripture He does. Just a few examples of this are the following passages. The first shows God’s unhappiness with how things turned out early on after He created the universe. God was pleased cause it was good and then God was sorry He made man on the earth a short while later.

Genesis 6:5-7 Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man [was] great in the earth, and [that] every intent of the thoughts of his heart [was] only evil continually. 6 And the LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. 7 So the LORD said, “I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beast, creeping thing and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made them.”

The next passage shows God learning that Abraham truly fears Him through Abraham’s commitment to God’s will over his. God tells us that NOW He knows. Not that He always new it to be so.

Genesis 22:12 And He said, “Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him; for NOW I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only [son,] from Me.”

The next passage God says “perhaps”. Perhaps the people will, perhaps they won’t. There is no such thing as God saying perhaps according to your rationalist philosophy. But, the God revealed in the Bible says “perhaps”.

Jeremiah 26:2-3 "Thus says the LORD: 'Stand in the court of the LORD’s house, and speak to all the cities of Judah, which come to worship [in] the LORD’s house, all the words that I command you to speak to them. Do not diminish a word. 3 'PERHAPS everyone will listen and turn from his evil way, that I MAY REPENT concerning the calamity which I purpose to bring on them BECAUSE OF the evil of their doings.’**

 

[TheOpenTheist]

…continued

breton said

No, I don’t believe this is “how He does it.”

Of course you don’t, being so steeped in the Neoplatonic rationalism that has been passed down to you and blindly accepted over (and even contrary to) what Scripture reveals God to be like.

This may be how you need to conceptualize it but this doesn’t sync with an omniscient, omnipotent God.

Omniscience, omnipotence and omnipresence all need clarification, or they become false if they are defined at face value. For example, will God be in Hell? No! Hell is a place where God’s presence is not. So God will not be everywhere, at least one day He won’t be. Therefore, Omnipresence is to be defined as God being everywhere that He wants to be.

And does God have full power over everything including all of humanity? No! Not yet anyways. And even in the future for God His relationship to redeemed humanity will not be one of complete power or control over us, but of love where all give and take to make the relationship work as it ought to. Therefore, Omnipotence is defined as God exercising all of the power that He has chosen to exercise so that He may have genuine relationships with His creation.

Likewise, does God know things about the future that are not true? No! For example, He does not know that Tampa Bay has won this year’s Super Bowl and will never know that to be true since it will not have happened this year. Even God knows that the most probable possibility is that the Colts will win the Super Bowl. So, God’s omniscience is coextensive with reality - He knows the future as it actually is. Therefore, God knows everything that is knowable, so that His knowledge of things is coextensive with reality.

And Scripture reveals that the sort of future God knows is one that is partly open, where possibilities become realities. Where the once partly open future becomes totally settled at the moment those possibilities become actual realities.

you end

Thank’s for the (name removed by moderator)ut but I think I will steer clear of “open theism”.

If you do not describe God according to the Open View you will contribute to the mass confusion that ideas like timelessness create and contribute to. Confusion that is very similar to what cynic is experiencing from having his mind programmed to believe such a thing from those around him (including the catholic church). Timelessness is false and does not help us to love, understand or relate to God any better.

 

[TheOpenTheist]

cynic:

I’ve attempted to answer why I think foreknowledge and predestination are the same thing. It is in our creation that a foreknowing God ‘makes’ us do this or that, if you believe in a foreknowing God that is. But I know there’s no point in argueing with you vern, you’ll simply repeat the same thing over and over again.

Out of interest I asked my muslim work mate, " do you believe that God already knows every choice we will make?"

His reply : “No, that would make existing pointless”. I can’t help but agree.

That is a good point you make. God does in fact foreknow as certain, as settled, everything that He predestinates. What needs to also be pointed out at the same time is the fact that God only predestinates some things. Not all things.

What that Muslim guy said reminds me of something that Markus Barth said, which is a favorite quote of mine.

A God who has fixed every detail beforehand may retire or die

 

[TheOpenTheist]

migurl asserted

God exists outside space and time

What evidence do you have to substantiate such a claim? The incarnation? The eucharist? If God exists “outside of space and time” as you claim then He has nothing to do with our world which is not “outside of space and time”. Then we don’t have a relationship with Him and he is truly not present at all in the eucharist

you claimed

therefore he looks at our lives as easily as we look thru a book.

That’s a pretty good example! It affirms that God is not timeless, but in the present, where He is looking through a book. It affirms that God knows all that is contained within that book only and nothing that is not in in that book. The history of God’s relating with this world will one day read like a great book, with a general plot and many plot twists in between the beginning and the end. Much of it is already found in the Bible.

you said

He doesn’t create people to go to hell, but He creates and can see what choices that person will make.

I agree in part. God knows some of the choices we will make, that which we will inevitably do, but not all of the choices we will make.

He doesn’t want us to go to hell

Amen!!

but because He chose to create us with free will He wouldn’t not create someone the He knows ends up in hell because that would violate His gift of free will.

No. If God knew for certain that any specific person would have to go to Hell, I believe He would ahve created a world that was in some way different. Perhaps He would at least. Still not sure about whether He would or not, but it seems likely that He would.

you go on

He creates freely, He will never stop creating, for He is The Creator by nature. If He didn’t create He wouldn’t be performing an action that defines Him as God.

That is true. And what’s more, creation is indeed an act. The creation was not there, and then God created it and it came into existence.

you asked

If you were a sculptor and you somehow KNEW which of your pieces would be clean and taken care of forever and which ones would be either broken, lost or stuffed in a corner to gather dust, would you only create the ones destined for greatness?

You would have to create them, since you now know the actual future. They will certainly be created at some point between the present moment and that part of the future you have seen. Otherwise, the futur that you came to know would turn out to be false and not the actual future.

you said

Or would you do what you love and create things you love hoping that those which end up breaking or getting lost will somehow lead to good, say for example inspiring someone, who at the sight of a broken piece, decides to dedicate their lives to collecting your works for the purpose of perseving them?

I would create them solely because they express what I believe or express something that I value. The artwork is a reflection of the person who created it and that gives it value whether those that follow preserve or collect it or not.

 

[TheOpenTheist]

Nance:

Good answer’s folk’s but how bout this…
Let’s suppose I go to hell (Gosh I hope not) I was created for His honor and glory, but my children or future grandchildren go to heaven, through free will and already God knows where I’m going to end up should my future generation lose out on their chances. What I’m saying is from the beginning I was formed to be and lived but chose an ultimate end, but bc of His love I was created which inturn brought life to my children so they could chose too.

The original question was why would God create humans that will end up in hell? I would like to think that the answer is they’re are possibly others after you who won’t

Just and opinion

I’m glad that is just a loose opinion of yours and not something that you strongly believe.

The reason is because God has told us that such a method is not to be used. It we are forbidden to do it, then for sure God is. These two passages show that God does not send people to Hell for the sake of helping others come to salvation as a result.

Isaiah 5:20 Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!

Romans 3:8 And [why] not [say,] “Let us do evil that good may come”? – as we are slanderously reported and as some affirm that we say. Their condemnation is just.

God does not do evil that good may come.

 

[corrgc]

This is still a great hurdle for me as well. But let me throw this out there, even though I am no theologian. In my studies of the prophet Isaiah, I see the power of the pagan nation - Assyria. The nation that will bring the fall of Israel. THis was a ruthless, plundering nation that left the Lord centuries before and developed thier own pagan gods. It was this nation the Lord allowed to plunder his chosen people. He simply allowed the Assyrians to continue thier chosen path and use them as his instrument of punishment against Israel. In Nahum chapters 2 & 3, the Lord speaks through Nahum of the coming destruction of Nineveh - the capital of Assyria, after they have over-run Israel.

Yet, In the book of Jonah we see Nineveh spared after they repent (much to the chagrin of Jonah)! Even after years of plundering and looting neighboring countries, the Lord was willing to accept their repentance!

Thus it only “appears” people are pre-destined for hell because of their wicked ways. In fact they at some point made a choice to turn away from God. With your free will if you so choose a path of evil and never repent, the Lord will simply allow it to lead to it’s logical conclusion and may even use you as an instrument in his plan of salvation (Cain, Pharoah, Assyria, Babylon, Judas, Hitler). But the free will to repent is never removed - no one is pre-destined to evil, we are ALL pre-destined for the glory of heaven - if we so choose.

Hope this helps.

P.S. I just won my bid on ebay for the book entitled “Predestination” by Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange. I was told this will help in answering my questions!

 

[TheOpenTheist]

corrgc:

This is still a great hurdle for me as well. But let me throw this out there, even though I am no theologian. In my studies of the prophet Isaiah, I see the power of the pagan nation - Assyria. The nation that will bring the fall of Israel. THis was a ruthless, plundering nation that left the Lord centuries before and developed thier own pagan gods. It was this nation the Lord allowed to plunder his chosen people. He simply allowed the Assyrians to continue thier chosen path and use them as his instrument of punishment against Israel. In Nahum chapters 2 & 3, the Lord speaks through Nahum of the coming destruction of Nineveh - the capital of Assyria, after they have over-run Israel.

Yet, In the book of Jonah we see Nineveh spared after they repent (much to the chagrin of Jonah)! Even after years of plundering and looting neighboring countries, the Lord was willing to accept their repentance!

Thus it only “appears” people are pre-destined for hell because of their wicked ways. In fact they at some point made a choice to turn away from God. With your free will if you so choose a path of evil and never repent, the Lord will simply allow it to lead to it’s logical conclusion and may even use you as an instrument in his plan of salvation (Cain, Pharoah, Assyria, Babylon, Judas, Hitler). But the free will to repent is never removed - no one is pre-destined to evil, we are ALL pre-destined for the glory of heaven - if we so choose.

Hope this helps.

P.S. I just won my bid on ebay for the book entitled “Predestination” by Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange. I was told this will help in answering my questions!

Excellent post corrgc! God does indeed predestine some things. What people fail to realize is that God is able to predestine what happens to groups, while still allowing men to have the freedom to join either group. Today there is the Body of Christ and those who are lost, basicly. That God predestined specific things concerning those who would become part of the Body of Christ is evident from passages like Eph 1.

Ephesians 1:3-5 Blessed [be] the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly [places] in Christ, 4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, 5 having predestined us to adoption as sons by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will

God predestines those who would become a member of His Body to be holy and without blame. The Body of Christ is chosen. The individuals are not specificly chosen.

 

[hurst]

TheOpenTheist:

…
God predestines those who would become a member of His Body to be holy and without blame. The Body of Christ is chosen. The individuals are not specificly chosen.

Excellent point! And once we choose to unite with the Body of Christ, we become chosen.

hurst

 

[TheOpenTheist]

Well, being in the Body through faith makes you united. At least united in what matters, which is trusting Christ for your salvation and loving God. Even if we disagree about specific things we are still members of the same Body.

 

[Donald45]

TheOpenTheist:

…Of course you don’t, being so steeped in the Neoplatonic rationalism that has been passed down to you and blindly accepted over (and even contrary to) what Scripture reveals God to be like…

As you’re no doubt aware, any informed Catholic would be unable to accept Open Theism as a valid doctrine of God. This, as you write, “Neoplatonic rationalism” is thought by OT’s to have entered the Church through St. Augustine, so that within five centuries, the faith had become largely corrupt. Of course, this claim is radically contradicted by the Church’s consistent two-thousand year doctrine of dogmatic authority. In Catholicism, doctrinal authority resides in Scripture and Tradition as articulated by the bishops in union with the Pope (the bishop of Rome). It does not rest with twentieth-century Neo-Protestants who decide to interpret the Bible according to their own a priori philosophical ideas and assumptions (note that the first systematic treatment on OT was published in 1994). Clearly, OT is a recently-devised theological novelty.

For Catholics, OT’s rejection of the unanimous teaching of the early Church Fathers (from Augustine onward), and of the Catholic doctrinal Tradition in general, concerning the nature and attributes of God automatically places it outside the bounds of a genuine (that is, an historically-based) Christian theology. Historically speaking, OT is a speculative and innovative Protestant novelty, which is itself rejected by the vast majority of even Protestant theologians. It is in no way bound to the historic teachings of the Christian Church, nor does it submit itself to the Church’s 2,000-year-old doctrinal Tradition which has been believed “everywhere, always, and by all.” OT is therefore not a legitimate theological option for Catholics. It is a relatively recent theological movement within Protestantism that seeks to re-define God’s traditional attributes (that is, his omniscience, omnipotence, etc.) in new and decidedly non-traditional ways. As a theological model, and when considered in light of Catholic doctrine, OT fails as a properly Christian view of God.

Truly,
Don

 

[Breton]

Wow, I’m way out of my league here. When you have to look up “Neoplatonic rationalism” in the dictionary, it must be time to head back to the kiddy-pool.

Let me share with you some of the information I have relied upon from the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which can be found here usccb.org/catechism/text/. Followed by further discussion on the timelessness of God by the Catholic Encyclopedia found here newadvent.org/cathen/.

Catechism of the Catholic Church
God alone IS
212 …He transcends the world and history. He made heaven and earth: “They will perish, but you endure; they will all wear out like a garment . . . but you are the same, and your years have no end.” In God “there is no variation or shadow due to change.” God is “He who Is,” from everlasting to everlasting, and as such remains ever faithful to himself and to his promises.
213 …God is the fullness of Being and of every perfection, without origin and without end. All creatures receive all that they are and have from him; but he alone is his very being, and he is of himself everything that he is.

Catholic Encyclopedia
INFINITY OF GOD
When we say that God is infinite, we mean that He is unlimited in every kind of perfection or that every conceivable perfection belongs to Him in the highest conceivable way. In a different sense we sometimes speak, for instance, of infinite time or space, meaning thereby time of such indefinite duration or space of such indefinite extension that we cannot assign any fixed limit to one or the other. Care should be taken not to confound these two essentially different meanings of the term. Time and space, being made up of parts in duration or extension, are essentially finite by comparison with God’s infinity. Now we assert that God is infinitely perfect in the sense explained, and that His infinity is deducible from His self-existence. For a self-existent being, if limited at all, could be limited only by itself; to be limited by another would imply causal dependence on that other, which the very notion of self-existence excludes. But the self-existing cannot be conceived as limiting itself, in the sense of curtailing its perfection of being, without ceasing to be self-existing.

ETERNITY
By saying that God is eternal we mean that in essence, life, and action He is altogether beyond temporal limits and relations. He has neither beginning, nor end, nor duration by way of sequence or succession of moments. There is no past or future for God – but only an eternal present. If we say that He was or that He acted, or that He will be or will act, we mean in strictness that He is or that He acts; and this truth is well expressed by Christ when He says (John 8:58 – A.V.): “Before Abraham was, I am.” Eternity, therefore, as predicated of God, does not mean indefinite duration in time – a meaning in which the term is sometimes used in other connections – but it means the total exclusion of the finiteness which time implies. We are obliged to use negative language in describing it, but in itself eternity is a positive perfection, and as such may be best defined in the words of Boethius as being “interminabilis vitae tota simul et perfecta possessio,” i.e. possession in full entirety and perfection of life without beginning, end, or succession.

Time being a measure of finite existence, the infinite must transcend it. God, it is true, coexists with time, as He coexists with creatures, but He does not exist in time, so as to be subject to temporal relations: His self-existence is timeless. Yet the positive perfection expressed by duration as such, i.e. persistence and permanence of being, belongs to God and is truly predicated of Him, as when He is spoken of, for example, as “Him that is, and that was and that is to come” (Revelation 1:4); but the strictly temporal connotation of such predicates must always be corrected by recalling the true notion of eternity.