GOD: WHO IS HE?
An Exposition of the Nature of God

By John A. O’Brien, Ph.D., LL.D.

Professor of the Philosophy of Religion

The University of Notre Dame

Today there is but one religious dogma in debate : What do you

mean by God? And in this respect, today is like all our yesterdays.

Professor Alfred Whitehead, Harvard University.

HPHE central problem facing mankind today is: What do you

mean by God? While that question has been of perennial

interest since man first wrestled with the meaning of life and the

destiny of the human soul, it is of paramount importance today.

The complexity of modern industrial civilization, tearing

man from his ancient moorings in the soil and concentrating

him in congested urban communities, is unsettling him. Living

at the bottom of a mountain of artificial gadgets, which make

up the pattern of his daily life, imprisoned in apartment cells

of concrete and steel, nature’s landscape and the feel of the

soil in his hands and under his feet have become but nostalgic

memories. As the neon lights in the city’s streets dazzle his

eyes with their blinding glare, his vision of his goal becomes

more obscure.

The uprooting of man from his ancient moorings in the soil

has had its spiritual counterpart in the profound changes which

have occurred in the intellectual climate of the twentieth

Nihil Obstat: T. E. Dillon, Censor Librorum.

Imprimatur: John F. Noll, D.D., Bishop of Fort Wayne.

July 28, 1947.

Copyright, 1947, by The Missionary Society of St. Paul the Apostle

in the State of New York

PRINTED AND PUBLISHED IN THE U. S. A. BY THE PAULIST PRESS, NEW YORK 19, N. Y.



century. The war has ravished the globe and has heaped agony

and death upon man and destruction upon all his works. In

consequence he finds himself reaching out desperately for some

pillar of support. Unless there is a Being who gives meaning

to human striving, life becomes a blindman’s buff, a tale told

by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

With his world tumbling to pieces around him—with the
atomic bomb hanging like the sword of Damocles over his

head—man is frantically seeking contact with the one Being
who can rescue him from his self-made madhouse and restore

his sanity and serenity. But how can he find God if he does

not know Him? He has been waylaid by false guides and

false prophets. Now he must find God or he will perish.

This little book seeks to aid man in his desperate plight

today. Against the background of the groping uncertainties

and confusions of our day, confusions made worse confounded

by the grotesquerie of some of our contemporary meta-

physicians, the pamphlet sets forth the nature of God as dis-

closed by reason and divine revelation and rendered pellucid in

the character of Jesus, the untarnished mirror of the Most High.

The answer to man’s groping uncertainties, the anodyne for

the spiritual distemper of our day, and the balm for his

wounded spirit are to be found in the clearer vision of God.

With that vision will come unfailingly the efforts to bring God

into one’s life. Walking always in the presence of God, clasp-

ing His outstretched hand, uniting himself to God in deeds of

love and service, man will find the answer to his restless quest-

ing in the Love that knows no ending and in the Light that

never fails.

— 2 —



Sources of Our Knowledge

From His footprints upon the earth and His handwriting

upon the illuminated manuscript of the skies we come to the

knowledge of the supreme architect of the universe—almighty

God. By a rigorous process of metaphysical reasoning, it may

be demonstrated that God is a Being infinitely perfect. The

personality of the God-man, Jesus Christ, takes these qualities

of perfection out of the blue of the skies and renders them in-

carnate before our very eyes. When we read of the mercy,

tenderness, humility, compassion and love of Christ, who

with His dying breath utters a prayer for the pardon of His

crucifiers, our hearts, like those of the Apostles who walked

with Him to Emmaus, bum within us.

The homage of our minds and the love of our hearts

go out to the divine Master who is the perfect model for all

mankind. In the measure in which we approximate His good-

ness and His love, do we rise in perfection. All who wish to

know God and to grow into His image and likeness will do well,

therefore, to study the character and life of Christ as revealed

to us in the Gospels.

We can further supplement that knowledge by availing

ourselves of the revelation contained in the other books of the

Bible. We can do this with logical propriety now, for we have

already established the fact of God’s existence from reason,

science and philosophy .
1 Because the picture which these latter

give us, however, is somewhat blurred and wraithlike due to the

1 See the author’s God: Can We Find Himt The Paulist Press, 401 West 59th

Street, New York 19, N. Y. (15c.)

— 3 —



limitations of the human mind, it is well for us to fill in that

outline with the revelations which the inspired writers of the

Old and of the New Testament give us.

The increased insight thus achieved will make God a more

potent influence in our lives. He will become for us in very

sooth the beginning and the end of all our striving. Our love

will mount with our knowledge, and our loyalty with our love.

Language Falters

We begin our task by pointing out how feeble and in-

adequate is human language to express the inexhaustible riches

and the infinite perfections of God. Words are but slender

and fragile bridges upon which we carry from mind to mind

the light cargo of human thought. Try to place upon them a

heavier burden and they collapse. They are like footbridges

made of trellised vines, scarcely able to support a single

traveler together with his knapsack for the day’s journey.

Burden him with the equipment and provisions for a journey

into a far country and you find that the trellised bridge groans

and reels and is unable to support the added weight. So the lan-

guage even of the inspired writers groans and staggers and is

unable to bear fully the burden of divine revelation.

Perceiving this, the writer of Ecclesiasticus says sig-

nificantly: “We shall say much, and yet shall want words”;

but struggling bravely under his burden, he continues, “the

sum of our words is: He is all.”

Our difficulty is further increased by the finite character

of the human mind in seeking to grapple with the infinite. God

— 4—



is infinite in all His perfections. Thus does He outstrip in all

directions the reaches of our limited understanding.

It is related that St. Augustine was walking along the

shore, trying to comprehend the infinite nature of God. A

little boy was digging a hole in the sand. Then filling his

little pail with water from the sea, he would pour it into

the hole.

“What are you trying to do, my child?” inquired the saint.

“I’m trying to empty the ocean into this hole,” replied the

child.

“You can’t do that. The ocean is much too big to be put

into such a tiny hole.”

“Neither can you with a finite mind comprehend the

infinite,” answered the child, who was thus revealed as an angel

sent by God to teach St. Augustine this fundamental truth.

Whether the incident be legendary or not, the lesson it teaches is

authentic and all-important.

While we can attain only a fragmentary knowledge of God,

even that fragment is of supreme importance and practical

value. The least knowledge of the highest things, observed

Aristotle thousands of years ago, far transcends in value the

most detailed knowledge of the lowest things. God is the

highest in the scale of value. He is the Summum Bonum, the

highest good, the supreme truth, infinite beauty, unutterable

love. Even a partial knowledge of Him is the pearl that

passeth all price. Realizing then the inadequacy of language

and the limitations of the human mind, we begin humbly and

reverently to try to peer even a little way into the infinite

perfections of God.

— 5 —



The Infinitude of God

God is revealed to us as a spirit, all-wise, all-powerful,

eternal and omnipresent. “God is a Spirit,” says our Lord,

“and they that adore Him, must adore Him in spirit and in

truth.” God is a simple Spirit. By this we mean that His

divine nature is not composed of parts and in it are no un-

realized potentialities. For only that which is material has

parts, and God is immaterial. Furthermore there is no combina-

tion of being and attributes, such as exists in creatures. The

divine nature is one and the same with its attributes. Thus

God is what He has , i.e., He is life, beauty, goodness, love. In

man these qualities exist in a fragmentary and partial manner.

In God they exist in their plenitude.

The infinitude of God surpasses the finite understanding

of man. “The things that are of God,” says St. Paul, “no man

knoweth, but the Spirit of God.”
2 “We know in part,” the

Apostle tells us, “and we prophesy in part.”
3
“It is impossible,”

declared St. Augustine, “thoroughly to grasp and comprehend

God, for couldst thou comprehend Him, he would not be

God .” 4 •

Since the mind of man is incapable of comprehending fully

God’s infinity, it is likewise incapable of devising a name to

express His greatness. Hence God is said to be ineffable.

Whatever name be used for God is inadequate, since it

designates only one aspect of His divine being. The most

sacred and significant name used by the ancient Hebrews

6—

2 2 Cor. ii. 11.

3 1 Cor. xiii. 9.

4 Serm. 41, de V. D.



is Jahve, meaning being. Something of the eternal being
of

God is reflected in the answer given to Moses who asked God

to tell him His name. “I am who am
”

replied God. “Thou

shalt say to the children of Israel: He who is hath sent me to

you.”
5
Unlike our existence, which is a series of consecutive

states, God’s is a perpetual now. “Before Abraham was made,

I am.”

Time and Eternity—What?
What is time? What is eternity? These are both difficult

questions. Philosophers have long struggled to ascertain the

essential nature of time. Yet probably none of them would

claim to have penetrated to the core of its being. We get some

inkling of its nature when we think of it as a way to measure

motion. Thus the measure of the earth’s motion on its axis

around the sun is the universally accepted time we use as a

measure for every other motion. This motion is comparatively

stable. It is continuous and, like all motion, successive.

Hence we divide it up into days, months, years and into

hours, minutes, seconds and fractions of a second. It is these

latter measures of motion which our watches indicate with

their hour, minute and second hands. While the astronomer

encounters many motions far faster than that of the earth,

he measures them in terms of the earth’s motions.

Were it not for motion, we would have no idea of time.

A man, sound asleep, is unconscious of the passing of time.

On the other hand, a person tossing sleeplessly on his bed,

hears the clock strike every quarter and wonders why the

5 Exod. iii. 14.

* 6 John viii. 58.

— 7—



seconds move with feet of lead. How interminable does a

minute seem to a basketball team struggling to protect a narrow

lead, while the opponents have possession of the ball. They

are acutely conscious of the slow passing of the time because

they are acutely conscious of every movement of their op-

ponents, fraught, as it is, with danger to them.

Let us scrutinize now more closely the relation between

time and motion. Here is a football player who has broken

loose for a long run, speeding with the ball from the fifty-yard

mark down toward the goal line. He is now at the twenty-five

yard mark. The motion of his legs that has carried him there

no longer exists. The motion that will carry him to the goal

does not yet exist. What does exist? Only the motion that

occurs on that twenty-five yard line, speeding him from there

to a point one step ahead.

So it is with time. The past exists no more. The future

is not yet born. All the reality of time, philosophers tell us, is

found in the present moment, the “flowing now/’ the present

instant that bridges the past and the future. The fundamental

reason why this is so is because change cannot take place in

an instant. Like the feet of the football player, moving one

after the other toward the goal, change has parts which come

one after the other in regular succession.

This succession of steps, characteristic of time and of human

life, does not apply to God, to whom the whole of existence is

the eternal present. Hence eternity is defined by Boethius as

“the simultaneously whole and perfect possession of intermin-

able life.” More briefly it has been described as the “now

— 8—



standing,” in contrast to the “now flowing” which is the nature

of time .
7 Man achieves a measure of perfection through a

succession of actions, living his life piecemeal, second by second.

God, however, has always possessed the complete perfection of

His Infinite Being. Eternity is not something external to God,

whereby we measure His duration. It is inherent in the nature

of an infinitely perfect Being.

Not only is God eternal, without beginning and without

end, but He is also immutable. By this we mean that the in-

finitely perfect Being undergoes no change. Any change in-

volves either increase or diminution which would be impossible

in a Being possessing every perfection in its fulness. “With

God,” says St. James, “there is no change nor shadow of

alteration.”
8

God is likewise immense or immeasurable. By this we mean

that He has no limitations in space. God does not merely exist

in the universe and with it, but also beyond and above it. This

is the truth which Solomon expressed at the dedication of the

Temple: “If heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain

Thee, how much less this house which I have built!” 9

The attributes of God’s being or existence are then eternity
,

immutability
,
immensity

,
and ubiquity. In reality these per-

fections are identical with the divine essence. The limitations

of our human intelligence, however, prevent us from under-

standing how these attributes or qualities constitute in God a

unified essence. Yielding to that limitation, we undertake to

7 The statement of Boethius, which has become a classic, is: Nunc fluens facit
tempus; nunc stans facit aeternitatem. It is a model of conciseness and brevity.

8 James i. 17.

9 3 Kings viii. 27.

— 9—



consider these attributes separately. We have already dis-

cussed, the first three.

We come now to a consideration of God’s ubiquity or omni-

presence. As this consideration
1

is, we think, of enormous

practical importance and furnishes strong motives for rectitude

of conduct in all the changing circumstances of human life,

we propose to treat it at some length.

God is omiripresent. By this we mean that He is every-

where, in heaven, on earth, and in every place. God is present

everywhere in three ways: by His essence, by His knowledge,

and by His superintending power.

Present by His Essence

God must be present wherever His action is because He is a

being of such infinite perfection that His substance and His

action are one and the same. God’s action extends throughout

the universe, governing the fall of the raindrop and the swing of

the farthest star. As the wind is present with the ship which

it propels, so God is present with every creature, holding it in

existence by His conserving power. The relation of a mover to

motion, of fire to heat, is not more intimate than God’s relation

to everything that exists. Well does St. Paul declare: “In
Him

we live and move and have our being
.” 10 Just as our soul

permeates our whole body, so does God pervade the entire vast

universe.

Herein we perceive an essential difference between a human

architect and the divine architect. When an edifice is com-

pleted, it stands without the aid of the builder. The works of

10 Acts xvii. 28.

— 10—



God, however, continue to lean upon Him for support. Unable

to subsist without Him, they depend upon Him as much
for

their conservation as they did for their creation.
As a glass

bulb, held in my upraised hand, would, if I withdraw my hand,

fall helplessly to the floor and break into fragments, so every

creature brought into being by the creative power of God would,

if He withdrew His conserving power, fall into the abyss of

nothingness.

Look up at the star-studded sky and realize that God is

there. Look through the telescope into the vastness of inter-

stellar space until you discern stars so dim in the far distance

that they eluded your naked eyes, and realize that God is there.

Descend with the diver into the ocean depths and there too you

will find God. Peer with the eyes of science into the mysterious

depths of a molecule of matter, and amidst the whirling of

protons and electrons in their unplumbed orbits, you will find

God. In the sublime words of Isaias, “Thus saith the Lord:

Heaven is my throne, and the earth my footstool.”
11

While God fills all space, He is circumscribed by none. He is

not dismembered nor divided. He is not partly here and partly

there, but entire everywhere throughout the universe. “He is

higher,” says, Job, “than heaven. He is deeper than hell. The

measure of Him is longer than the earth, and broader than the

sea.”
12

What a source of comfort and of strength is it for us to

realize that God is present always and everywhere. Nature

abhors a vacuum and the human heart dreads loneliness. It

11 Isaias lxvi. 1.

12 Job ii, 8, 9,

r-11 —



shrinks from the thought of being imprisoned in a solitary cell

of matter, with no mind to know its hunger, and no heart to beat

in unison with its throbbing. God is the answer to the cry of

every heart for companionship and life and love. God is present

with us wherever we go. If we mount on the wings of an air-

plane high into the fleecy sky, God is there. If our labor takes

us down into the inky blackness of a mine to dig coal from

the bowels of the earth, God is there. He envelops the chair

upon which we sit. He dwells within our throbbing heart. He

interpenetrates our very being with His divine presence more

completely than water penetrates a sponge. He envelops us

more thoroughly than the waters of the sea its finny denizens,

more intimately than the air surrounds the bird in its flight.

The Apostle crowds this spacious truth into brief compass when

he says: “In Him we live and move and have our being.”

Present* by His Knowledge

God is present with us not only by His essence, but also by

His omniscient intelligence which extends to the movement of

the farthest star, to the fall of every leaf from its tree, and to

the stirring of every living creature. Since God is infinitely

perfect, He must possess omniscience—all knowledge. If there
were anything which God did not know, no matter how small

or how hidden, His knowledge would be only finite. But God

is infinite in every respect, in His power, in His righteousness,

and in his Knowledge.

We can get some glimmering of how God can be present by

His knowledge from our own experience in listening to the

— 12 —



radio. When we tune in to a symphony concert, and secure

from the broadcaster a vivid picture of the opera
hall, the

musicians, the audience and then listen to the music, we feel

that we are present. We know all that is occurring there.

We hear the great melodies of music from their gentle

beginnings to their soaring and roaring climaxes. So too when

we listen to a speech, a drama, a baseball game, we have such

detailed knowledge, simultaneous with the event being
broad-

cast, that we feel we are present.

Indeed, listening to a radio while undergoing an exciting

experience elsewhere gives one the sensation of enjoying the

power of bilocation—of being in two different places at the same
time. This was the writer’s experience in flying in a plane

traveling 150 miles an hour over the English Channel. Down

below were throngs of ships looking like large splinters on a

glassy surface, with the English coast just appearing on the

horizon. With the plane soaring through the heavens at

tremendous speed, battling head winds and gusts of storm,

suddenly the pilot slipped over my ears the head-phones of a

radio.

In came the soft melodious voice of a concert singer from

the Opera House in Vienna. It was so clear that I felt as

though I were present in that audience. Here I was with the

shores of France fading and the green fields of England coming

into my view, while the scene in the Vienna Opera House was

equally vivid and clear. Thus did I seem to be present at both

places, in spite of their distance, through the knowledge that

was coming through my different senses of sight and hearing.

If man with his limited knowledge can thus achieve a sense of

— 13 —



being present simultaneously in different places, how much more

easily can an infinite God, who knows the smallest detail of

every happening, achieve through such knowledge a presence

throughout the universe.

The Eternal Present

The past, the present, and the future are all spread out

before God, like a vast panorama. He sees them all, as it were,

in one view. Strictly speaking, there is no past or future to

God. He lives in the eternal present. The division of time into

successive moments of duration is necessitated by the finite

character of the human mind. But God’s eternal knowledge,

evident from His infinity, excludes successive moments, ex-

cludes past and future. Succession necessarily involves a loss

and a gain, the abandoning of one moment’s experience for that

of the next succeeding moment. The infinite, however, ex-

perience no increase or diminution, no loss or gain.

As every aspect of the infinite surpasses the capacity of

man’s finite mind thoroughly to understand, so God’s infinite

and eternal knowledge stretches beyond man’s complete com-

prehension. An illustration or two, however, will help. The

explorer, climbing up the stately Jungfrau, sees one side of the

mountain at a time. As he crosses over to a different side he

perceives new contours, new vistas of its massive bulk, tower-

ing up into the Swiss skies. If he were, however, in an airplane

poised high above it, he could with a single glance perceive the

snow-crowned summit, and all its sides stretching down to the

lower earth. The mighty vista he is able to secure from his

— 14—



exceptional vantage point helps us to get
at least a glimmering

of the all-embracing vision of God.

Let us take another illustration. Two great football
teams,

unbeaten and untied, meet to decide the
question of supremacy.

Battling with fury, desperation and
abandon, they send

alternate fevers of hope and chills of fear,
thrills of joy and

pangs of dismay, into the vast crowd of
spectators. For about

two hours they hold the spectators
breathless and spellbound.

The battle is filmed.

Now suppose that instead of a few feet of the film
being

thrown on the screen, all of it were thrown
simultaneously on a

tremendously wide screen. If our vision were
adequate, we

would see the final play simultaneously with
the opening kick-

off. This will help us to see how an infinite and
omniscient God

perceives all things, not in a succession of
moments but in a

single eternal now. It is well to keep in
mind God’s reply to

Moses: “I am who am” Thus did God bring out the sublime

truth that with Him there is no succession of time, that He
lives

and sees and knows in the eternal present.

God's Knowledge and Human Freedom

Consequently it is inaccurate and misleading to
speak of

God’s foreknowledge. God does not foreknow.
He knows.

Difficulties which are based upon the use of such
a misleading

term fall to the ground when we remove this
incorrect term

when referring to the eternal and infinite
knowledge of God.

True, the term may be employed in discussing the
matter in a

popular manner with people untrained in
metaphysical reason-

ing. Care should be taken, however, to
point out that it is

— IS—



merely an accommodation to our customary way of speaking

and to the limitations of our finite mind and that any difficulties

arising from such usage are merely verbal difficulties, and do not

flow from the operations of the divine powers or attributes

when properly stated.

Such a difficulty is the one raised in connection with God’s

knowledge and the free actions of man. If one speaks of God

foreknowing the actions of man, the implication may be un-

wittingly conveyed that such actions are foreordained and

necessary and that free will plays no part. The difficulty col-

lapses, however, when we remove the misleading term, fore-

know, and point out that God does not foreknow. He knows.

Thus God’s knowledge may be viewed as a mirror of the free

actions of man.

As I look out of my window, I see students playing tennis.

They are playing because they want to play. My knowledge

of their actions is not the cause, but the result of the exercise

of their free will in the manner described. So may God’s knowl-

edge of all the actions of humanity be said to be.

This is the solution given by some of the greatest Christian

thinkers to the objection of infidels. “Things do not happen,”

declared Origen back in the third century, “because God fore-

sees them in the distant future; but because they will happen,

God knows them before they happen.” Similar is the observa-

tion of St. Jerome in the fifth century: “Not because God

knows that something will happen, must it therefore happen.

But God, knowing the future, foresees it, because it is to

happen.” We cannot point out too often that what we call past

and future stand before God as the eternal present.

— 16—



If you ask us how God knows all things in the perpetual

now, we answer: We don’t know. God is infinite, and no finite

mind can comprehend the infinite. Otherwise it would not be

finite. Our inability thoroughly to understand how God knows

presents no difficulty to our acceptance of the fact of God’s

infinite and eternal knowledge. We do not know how a blade

of grass grows, yet we experience no difficulty in accepting the

fact that it does grow. If we meet with mysteries wherever our

eyes fall upon finite things, why should we not be prepared to

meet with mysteries when we are dealing with the infinite?

Practical Implications

Our reverence and awe are deepened when we reflect upon

the all-embracing knowledge and the infinite wisdom of God.

“He telleth the number of the stars,” says the Psalmist, “and

calleth them all by their names.” 13 There is not a star whirling

its lonely way in the outermost stretch of cosmic space, not a

bird winging its way across the trackless sky, not a blade of grass

in the verdant carpets of the Western prairies, not a fish in the

ocean’s depths, not an insect burrowing its way in the bowels

of the earth, not a grain of sand on the seashore, not an electron

whirling in the unplumbed depths of a tiny atom, that escapes

the all-seeing eye of God. Even “the very hairs of your head,”

the Saviour discloses, “are all numbered.” 14

How impossible it is to hide our thoughts or our deeds from
the all-seeing eye of God. We may escape detection from the
eyes of neighbors, and even from the prying eyes of officers

of the law. But the deeds done in secret are as the pages of an

13 Psal. cxlvi. 4.

14 Matt. x. 30.

— 17—



open book to the eyes
of God. “Shall a

man lie hid in secret

XL and I notJ him, saith the Lord.”
“ SmJ* says

SL

Paul: “There is no
creato^mv^tWe m^ rs g

, ^
thincrs are naked and open

to His eyes. j

Lord,” says the author
of the book of

Proverbs, “in every
place

behold good and evil.
, t

v oii-encom-

The utter futility of
trying to escape

from the all enco

passing vision of
God is told with moving

eloquence by the

E Prophet: “Lord, thou hast known my sitting down
and my rising up. Thou

has understood1 my thoughtsafe
ofi,

mv oath and my line thou
hast searched out.

And thou has

foreseen all my ways. . . .
Behold, O Lord, thou hast

knownSX fast and those of old . . . thy knowledge - bj«-
wonderful to me; it is high,

and I cannot re^h tod.
Win

shall I go from thy
Spirit? or whither shall

I flee from thy facet

the morning and
dwell in the uttermost

part of the sea, even

tore also shall thy
hand lead me, and

thy right hand shall

h0l<

Every

1

law-maker as well as
every student of

human

behavior realizes the
importance of

establishing proper

sanctions, in the form of
rewards and penalties,

*

observance of laws.
Without such teeth to

enforce them

are scarcely worth
the paper they are

written on. What

magnificent sanction
for the observance

of tBemomUaw

foimd in the fact
that not merely a

minor official but the

15 Jer. xxiii. 24.

16 Heb. iv. 13.

17 Proverbs xv.
3.

18 Psal. cxxxviii.
1-10.

— 18—



Supreme Legislator Himself perceives every observance as
well

as every violation, and will mete out reward or
punishment

according to one’s deserts. Here is a sanction which is worth

more than all the skilled operatives in the F. B. I. and
more

than all the brass-buttoned policemen in all our cities.

This is the sanction which the inspired author of Ec-

clesiasticus brings out so clearly. He pictures the sinner say-

ing to himself: “Who seeth me? Darkness compasseth me

about, and the walls cover me, and no man seeth me: whom do

I fear? The Most High will not remember my sins. And he

understandeth not that His eye seeth all things . . . and he

knoweth not that the eyes of the Lord are far brighter than the

sun, beholding round about all the ways of men and the bottom

of the deep, and looking into the hearts of men, into the most

hidden parts. For all things were known to the Lord God before

they were created: so also after they were perfected, He

behoideth all things.”
19 The person tempted to sin would do

well to reflect upon these words of the sacred writer. Surely the

inclination to violate an ordinance of the Most High will

speedily vanish if one realizes that the eyes of God are upon

him and His hands are already fashioning the sinner’s deserts.

Present by His Power

God is present everywhere not only by His essence, not

only by His infinite knowledge, but also' by His superintending

power. Just as the soul pervades the body and is necessary for

every movement I make, so God’s concurring power is necessary

for every move I make, for every word I utter, and for every

19 Ecclus. xxiii. 25-29.

19—



thought I think. Just as God brought
us into existence out of

the yawning abyss of nothingness
by His creative power, so

He sustains us in existence by His conserving
power. Were

God to withdraw His sustaining hand
from us for one instant,

we would fall back into the nothingness
from which we came.

God is as necessary for our life as the air
we breathe.

While God is present throughout the whole
universe by His

essence, knowledge and power, He is present
in the chosen

members of the human family in a still more
intimate manner.

The prophet Jeremias tells of this
mysterious indwelling of

God: “Behold the days shall come,
saith the Lord, and I will

make a new covenant with the house
of Israel and with the

bouse of Juda: not according to the
covenant which I made with

their fathers. . . . But this shall be the
covenant that I shall

make with the house of Israel: I will
give my law in their

bowels, and I will write it in their
heart: and I will be their

God, and they shall be my people.”
20

Present
1

in intimate Manner

In the tabernacle of every
faithful and devout soul God

dwells in a particular manner.
Attentive indeed are His ears

to the prayers of the person
who communes with Him within

this living temple. It is
of this divine Presence that St.

Paul

writes to the Corinthians:
“Know ye not that you are the

temple of God, and that the Spirit
of God dwelleth in you?

But if any man violate the temple
of God, him shall God

destroy. For the temple of God is holy,
which you are.”

21 With

Tennyson can the devout soul say:

20 Jer. xxxi. 31-33.

21 1 Cor. iii. 16. — 20



Speak to Him, thou, for He hears, and Spirit

with Spirit can meet

—

Closer is He than breathing, and nearer

than hands and feet.

God is present in an especially intimate manner in the soul

that is filled with the love of God. Such a person is fulfilling

the great commandment, in which are contained all the laws and

the prophets. “If any one love me,” said Jesus, “my Father

will love him, and we will make our abode with him.”
22

It was

in this manner that God abode with Abraham, Isaac, and

Jacob; with Moses, Josue, and David; with the prophets,

Apostles, and martyrs; and with all the holy souls who clung

to Him in deeds of righteousness, in prayer, and in acts of

love. God and one constitute a majority. When God is with

one, he need fear no power in heaven, on earth, or under the

earth.

The realization of the intimate presence of God in the souls

of those who love and serve Him is a powerful bulwark against

temptation and an incentive to strive constantly to make one’s

soul a more fitting habitation for the Most High. For this reason

there are few exercises of the spiritual life more profitable than

that of the practice of the presence of God, the constant

recollection, even if only subconscious, of the indwelling of our

maker, our best friend, and our ultimate judge. When we

forget about God, and turn our backs upon Him, then danger

stares us in the face.

Creatures can at times take on such a garb of attractiveness

22 John xiv. 23.

— 21 —



that, almost before we realize it, we find our
hands stretching

out to possess them. The experience of the
race, sad and tragic

as it is, shows us, however, that
they are like Dead Sea apples

that crumble at the touch. They do not
yield the promised

joy but only boredom, nausea and remorse.
We shall be spared

from learning by the costly method of
painful experience, if

we remember the all-important fact of God’s
presence. Thus

sin becomes an offense not to a distant
Being in the far-off

firmament, but an insult to One present within
us. Is it likely

that an individual will deliberately insult
a friend in his very

presence?

Cannot Flee from God

Futhermore one cannot flee from God’s
presence, even if he

would. He may depart from His friendship but not
from His

presence. Even though guilty, he must still
face his maker and

his judge. What experience in life is more
embarrassing and

painful than that of facing a friend
with whom you have not

kept faith? What gnaws more deeply into the
marrow of your

being than the agony which comes from
the realization that

you have shattered the high ideals that
he has held of you?

The shame you experience is hotter than a
red-hot iron, more

piercing than a serpent’s tooth. How can one escape
that

bitter humiliation, that cup of gall, if one
fails to keep faith

with His Lord and Master who has deigned to
make His abode

within the individual’s heart and soul?

The realization of God’s abiding presence is
helpful not only

in resisting temptation but also in bearing
with patience and

even*with joy the hardships and the
pains which life in this

— 22 —



valley of the shadow of death inevitably
brings. Is it not

easier to bear sickness and pain when we know that
we are in

the presence of friends, doctors and nurses
who will not fail to

do all an their power to help us? So likewise
the consciousness

of the presence of our best friend
will not fail to give us

strength to carry our burden and to bear our
suffering with

patience and resignation.

God will not fail to make each moment of pain bear its rich

fruition in the ineffable joys of life everlasting.
Such tribulation

as He permits to fall upon us is but the “shade of His
hand

outstretched caressingly.” In all the vicissitudes
of life, in

times of joy, temptation, or suffering, the
consciousness of the

presence of God will not fail to give us the humility, the pro-

tection, and the strength which we need.

We have presented at some length the truth of God’s abid-

ing presence throughout the universe and throughout the
whole

of human life. We have done so because a realization of this

important truth is bound to exercise an enormous influence in

our lives. “The more we are penetrated with this thought,”

observes Cardinal Gibbons, “the more perfectly shall we possess

interior freedom, indifference to human judgment, and a

habitual disposition to rectitude of conduct.”
23

When my students at Notre Dame came to me to say

“Good-bye,” before being sent to the far-flung battlefronts

of World War II, I could think of no truth more comforting

to propose to them than that of the constant presence of God.

“Remember,” I was accustomed to say, “whether you are

sent to the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific, or to the

23 Cardinal Gibbons. Our Christian Heritage, J. Murphy Co..
Baltimore, p. 70.

— 23 —



Aleutians in the far North, to Tunisia or to any of the countries

of Europe; whether you are assigned to a submarine to
prowl in

the depths of the sea, or to an airplane to wing
your way

through the trackless skies, or to be encased in a
mighty iron

tank to penetrate to areas where no other vehicle can travel
. . .

remember that God is with you wherever you go.”

It has not always been easy for youth to leave home and

friends and native land to go out to face death in all its
hideous

forms in the far comers of the world. But what, perhaps
more

than anything else, nerved them for the difficult task which
their

country asked of them, was the realization that God went with

them all the way . It is a truth, as helpful as it is comforting,

for old and young. To clasp the outstretched hand of God in all

our gropings and wanderings is to find a sure and a safe
road.

Omniscience and Omnipotence

Thus far we have presented the principal attributes of God’s

being or existence. Now for a brief word about those belonging

to His knowledge and to His will.

The attributes belonging to God’s knowledge are omniscience

and wisdom . By omniscience, we mean that God knows every-

thing perfectly and has known it from all eternity. The past

and the future, as we have already pointed out, stand before

God as in the living present. God is also all-wise. By this we

mean that He knows how to dispose everything so as best to

accomplish what He wills. Wisdom in creatures is different

from knowledge. Knowledge may consist of mere information.

Wisdom is the ability to use that information to the best

advantage.

— 24—



The knowledge then of all that is contained in all the

encyclopedias and libraries in the world would not necessarily

indicate that such a man is wise. He might not know how to

use such encyclopedic knowledge. In God, however, knowledge

and wisdom are one with each other and with the divine

essence. “How great,” says the Psalmist, “are thy works, O

Lord! Thou hast made all things in wisdom.”
24

The chief attributes of God’s will are omnipotence, freedom,

sanctity, justice, goodness, mercy, patience, fidelity. By omnip-

otence, we mean that God can do all things and that nothing

is hard or impossible to Him. God can accomplish whatever

He wishes by a mere act of His will. “No word,” the Angel

Gabriel reveals, “shall be impossible with God .”
26 With God,

to will and to perform, constitute one and the same act. This

follows from God’s infinite perfection which includes boundless

power and excludes the imperfections of effort, toil, fatigue and

successive partial accomplishment.

Can God make a square circle? Can God make a rock so

large that He cannot lift it? These are variations of the old

question: What happens when an irresistible force meets an

immovable object? The answer is: These all involve con-

tradictions and are therefore devoid of all reality. God can do

anything, but the contradictions mentioned, and all others like

them are nothing. Their intrinsic repugnance puts them beyond

the sphere of both physical and metaphysical possibility and

strips them of all being.

24 Psal. ciii. 24.

25 Luke i. 37.

— 25—



'The Depth of the Riches .

.

It is not necessary to develop
each of the previously

mentioned attributes of God’s will. They
and all the other

noble attributes which the human mind
can conceive, exist

in their fullness, without an alloy
of imperfection, in the in-

finite perfection of God. No catalog could
list all His

perfections. No litany could sing all His glories.
We find

ourselves exclaiming with St. Paul: “O the depth
of the riches

of the wisdom and of the knowledge of
God! How incom-

prehensible are His judgments, and how
unsearchable His

ways! For who hath known the mind of the
Lord? Or who

hath been His counsellor? . . . For of
Him, and by Him, and in

Him are all things: to Him be glory forever. Amen.”
26

The formal language of philosophy and
theology, while

accurate as far as it goes, falters and collapses
in the effort to

reveal the heights and the depths of the
unsealed and un-

fathomed being of the infinite God. We can secure, however,

some feeble concept of the perfections of
the Almighty , when

we realize that the admirable and lovable
qualities found in the

noblest of human beings are all found in their
plenitude in

Him. These qualities can exist in only a limited
way in human

beings because their containers are limited.

Years ago the writer sat one evening at sunset
looking out

over the waters of the sea of Galilee along
whose shores the

divine Master had so often walked with His
Apostles. Suddenly

my reverie was broken by the arrival of a group of
native

women. They had come, as their forebears from
time im-

26 Rom. ii. 33, 34, 36.

— 26—



memorial had come, to fill their vessels
from the. waters of the

ancient sea. Then, placing their vessels
on their heads, they

returned to their homes. They come to
a goodly lake, but

they go away with such a tiny bit. Not
because there is no more

water to take, but because that is
all their receptacles will

contain.

How like a picture of humanity! We come
from the

illimitable ocean of the being and perfections
of the infinite

Creator. But we carry away only a few tiny
drops of that

vast ocean because that is all our finite
human nature will bear.

What the mighty expanse of the waters of the
Pacific is to the

thimblefull scooped out by a little child, the
immeasurable

being of the infinitely perfect God is to the finite
being of man.

We are a drop of water. He is the mighty sea. We are
a grain

of sand. He is the vast seashore. We are a splinter of
time.

He is the ageless sequoia. We are a farthing candle. He is
the

blinding sun.

"His Magnifience Is Wonderful"

The perception of the grandeur, the majesty, and the
power

of God in contrast with the puniness of man stirred
many a

prophet of old to reach the heights of eloquence.
Listen to

Ecclesiasticus as he wrestles with this mighty theme:
“What

shall we be able to do to glorify Him? For the Almighty
Himself

is above all His works. The Lord is terrible, and exceeding

great, and His power is admirable. Glorify the Lord as
much as

ever you can, for He will yet far exceed, and His magnificence

is wonderful. Blessing the Lord, exalt Him as much as you

can: for He is above all praise. When you exalt Him put

— 27 —



forth all your strength, and be not weary; for you can never

go far enough. Who shall see Him, and declare Him? and who

shall magnify Him as He is from the beginning? There are

many things hidden from us that are greater than these; for

we have seen but a few of His works.”
27

Similar too are the sentiments uttered by the great prophet

of divine unity, Isaias. “Praise ye the Lord, and call upon

His name: make His works known among the people: re-

member that His name is high. Sing ye to the Lord, for He

hath done great things: show this forth in all the earth.

Rejoice and praise, O thou habitation of Sion: for great is He

that is in the midst of thee, the Holy One of Israel.”
28

"The Light of the World"

There is no theme so worthy of our reverent consideration as

that of God, His nature and attributes. “This,” says St. John,

“is eternal life: that they may know thee, the only true God.”
29

We avail ourselves of the ripe thought of the greatest phil-

osophers and theologians to peer a little way into the illimitable

being of God. We supplement it with the insight of the

prophets and inspired writers of the Old and of the New

Testament. We lean upon the consideration of all the per-

fections found in human creatures to try to conceive what the

result would be if they were all combined in their fullness in a

single personality.

More authentically still do we see God mirrored in the

winsome figure of Jesus. He is God incarnate, and reflects the

27 Eccles. xliii. 30-37.

28 Isaias xii. 4-6.

29 John xvii. 3.

— 28—



mercy, the compassion, and the love that till the heart of God.

Repeated and devout reading of the Gospels will make the

personality of Christ a living influence in our lives and thus

make us more Godlike. “Draw near to God,” says St. James,

“and He will draw near to you.”
30 The more earnestly we strive

to know God, to serve Him, and to love Him, the more in-

timately will God dwell in our souls and make His radiant

presence known to us .
31

God is the answer to the cry of every lonely soul for friend-

ship and love. He is the end of our ceaseless quest for life

and happiness. He is the end of the rainbow, the Alpha and

the Omega, the beginning and the end of all things. He is the

light of the world, and they who follow Him do not walk in

darkness, but shall have the light of life. He is love unutterable,

and the only love that can still our restless hearts. “Our

hearts,” says St. Augustine, “have been made for Thee, O God,

and they shall never rest, until they rest in Thee.” The practice

of the presence of God fills our heart with a quiet peace and

makes our face to shine with a radiance which neither clouds

can obscure nor grief banish. To know God is to love Him and

to serve Him is to reign.

30 James iv. 8.

31 For a more extensive presentation of these vital and supremely important

truths, the reader is advised to secure a copy of the author's Truths Men Live By.

Macmillan Co., N. Y. ($3.00.)

— 29—



QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

1.

Why is the meaning of God of such
paramount im-

portance today? .

What has uprooted man from his
ancient moorings.

What are some of the changes which
have occurred

in the intellectual climate
of the 20th Century.

What is the answer to man’s groping
uncertainties.

What are the sources of our knowledge
of God?

u. How may we measure our growth
in holiness?

7. Why does language falter in seeking
to mirror the

nature of God?

What does the writer of Ecclesiasticus
say on this

point?
.

Relate the incident concerning
St. Augustine.

What truth does the incident illustrate?

State and comment on the observation
of Aristotle.

8

9.

10 .

II

1. What do we mean when we say
that God is a simple

Spirit?

2. Why is God said to be ineffable?

3. How do we get some inkling into
the nature of

time?
.

-

4 Why would we have no idea of time
were it not tor

'

motion? Illustrate your answer

5. What do we mean by the immutability
of God . By

His immensity?

6. What are the four attributes
of God s being or

existence ?

7. In what three ways is God
omnipresent?

— 30—



8. What is meant by saying that God is present by His

Essence? Illustrate.

9. What is the essential difference between a human

artist and the divine artist?

10. Quote Job on the presence of God.

11. Why is the omnipresence of God a source of com-

fort and of strength to us?

Ill

1. What do we mean when we say that God is present

by His knowledge?

2. How can we get some glimmering of such presence?

Illustrate.

3. What is meant by the eternal present?

4. What necessitates a division of time?

5. Illustrate how God’s infinite and eternal knowledge

stretches beyond a man’s comprehension.

6. Why is it inaccurate to speak of God’s fore-

knowledge?

7. What is the problem of reconciling God’s knowl-

edge with human freedom?

8. How is that problem solved? Illustrate your answer.

9. Quote the observation of Origen. Of St. Jerome.

10. Do we understand how God knows? Why?

11. What are some of the practical implications of

God’s presence by His knowledge?

12. What does the Royal Prophet say on this point?

13. What is the meaning of sanctions? How does God’s

presence by His knowledge provide sanctions for

man?
IV

1. What is meant when we say that God is present

by His superintending power?

2. What does Jeremias say on this point?

— 31 —



3. Where is God present in a particularly intimate

manner?

4. Quote the words of St. Paul on this point. Of

Jesus.

5. What are among the most profitable exercises of

the spiritual life? Why?

6. Why cannot creatures flee from God?

7. What does Cardinal Gibbons say on this subject?

8. What was the author accustomed to say to his

students on leaving for military service?

9. What is meant by the omniscience of God?

10.

Distinguish between wisdom and knowledge. Il-

lustrate your answer.

V

1. What is meant by the omnipotence of God?

2. Can God make a square circle?

3. Quote the words of St. Paul on the wisdom and the

knowledge of God.

4. What illustration is offered of the illimitable

knowledge of God and of the finite mind of man?

5. Work out an illustration of your own on this sub-

ject.

6. What does Ecclesiasticus say concerning the

majesty of God?

7. Quote the words of Isaias on this point.

8. What, according to St. John, constitutes eternal

life?

9. Who is the authentic mirror of God?
10. Why is God the answer to the cry of every lonely

soul?

11. Why shall our hearts never rest until they rest in

God?
—*32 —