My beloved spiritual children in Christ Our Only True God and Our Only True Savior,
CHRIST IS IN OUR MIDST! HE WAS, IS, AND EVER SHALL BE.
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THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
Who is God?
God is He (we know He is a "He" because Jesus referred to Him as a Father) Who made the world and Who made everything in it visible and invisible. He is our Father in heaven. Of course, one may argue that that is a very limited argument for someone who does not believe. So the question is: How can one at least listen to the arguments that God exists; in our day, perhaps that argument may come from science itself. If it indeed a revolutionary experience to see that in our century, science has resurrected God beyond anybody's expectations. Let us what they have to say:
Scientists are hard to work in a committee, an academic friend once told me, because they often change their minds when they see new evidence. I was reminded of this a few months ago when I saw a survey in the journal Nature. It revealed that 40 percent of Americans physicists, biologists, and mathematicians believe in God and not just some metaphysical abstraction, but a deity who takes an active interest in our affairs and hears our prayers: the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
This percentage, it turns out, is exactly the same as it was in 1916 when an identical poll was taken. Strikingly, as the nation's intelligentsia has turned toward atheism, man in the scientific community have struck to theism. They apparently haven't changed their minds about whether God exists.
But should they have? In the 19th century, religious orthodoxy endured blow after blow at the hands of science. Geologists fatally undermined the literal truth of Genesis, making a mockery of Bishop Usher's calculation (arrived at by totting up the "begets" in the Bible) that the creation took place in 4004 BC. Chemists demystified life by synthesizing its organic molecules in the lab. Darwin and Wallace's theory of evolution seemed to banish Divine Providence from the sphere of nature once and for all, replacing it with the groping of blind science. "There is no God and the ape is our Adam" cried a vexed Cardinal Manning.
The quasi-scientific 19th-century school of thought known as materialism, which held that matter is the fundamental and final reality, excluded the possibility of an immortal soul. Man was a machine; the brain produced consciousness as the liver secreted bile. And if matter was eternal, as the laws of conservation suggested, it made no sense to suppose that a creator could have brought the material universe into existence es nihilo at some point in the past.
Newton had thought that the deity's role was to make occasional adjustments to the solar system lest it runs down, an idea that Voltaire and the other philosophers of the Enlightenment found congenial. But Newton's 19th-century successors demonstrated that a clockwork universe was actually self-sustaining; no divine help was required to keep it operating smoothly. When Napoleon asked Laplace where God fit into his equations of celestial mechanics, the great physicist coolly replied, "Sir, I had no need of that hypothesis."
It was this new spirit of scientific rationality that allowed Nietzsche to declare that God was dead. By the turn of the century, skepticism about the claims of faith had become the norm among thinking types, including scientists. As far as the typical intellectual was concerned, religion was at best a socially necessary fiction. At worst, it was dangerous humbug-the opiate of the masses.
But if the scientific findings of the 19tth century eroded belief in God, those of the 20th century have had just the opposite evidential force, although few intellectuals outside science have come to terms with this. Traditional arguments for the existence of God, which seemed outmoded a century ago, have had new life breathed into them.
Take the "cosmological argument." Why does the universe exist at all?
Philosophers of an Aristotelian kidney reasoned that it must have an external cause-a creator, namely God. By the 19th century, the cosmological argument had ceased to be taken seriously. If the universe has always been around, the revised thinking went, then maybe its existence was just a brute fact requiring no further explanation.
In this century, however, it has been discovered-much to the surprise of scientists like Einstein-that the universe hasn't always been around. Rather, it suddenly exploded into being some 15 billion years ago in a flash of light and energy. The abrupt emergence of a world out of nothingness with the big bang bears an uncanny resemblance to the Genesis command: "Let there be light..." Atheists now had some explaining to do.
Then there is the "argument from design" the claim that nature is so wondrously fashioned that it must have been the handwork of a Divine Artificer. The wing of the eagle, the shape of the orchid, the swiftness of the antelope: all these weren't produced by a beneficent deity, submitted 19the century Darwinists, but by random mutation and natural selection. Since then, critics of a religious bent have sought to show that the theory of evolution is false or at best, incomplete. The biochemist Michael J. Behe argued that gradualist Darwinian processes could never have given rise to the intricate molecular machines of life.
How can there be God?
There can be one God, because He revealed Himself to Adam and Eve, to Moses and to the Prophets, and, especially, because He appeared in the Person of His Son, Jesus Christ.
Can we know through common sense that there is God?
Yes, we can know through common sense and reason that there is God because everything around us proves that the is God. Nothing can come to existence by itself; a house requires a builder; a watch needs a watchmaker. So, heaven, earth, and all things visible and invisible (Angels) presuppose a Creator. The fact that there is a certain order in the universe also proves that the order was designated by a very intelligent Mind. That Mind is God.
Do all people everywhere believe that there is God?
Yes, everywhere and always people believed that there is God. History and anthropology/sociology teach us that there were no people who did not somehow believe in God. That God, however, may not have been the True God that Christians believe.
What is conscience?
Conscience is a voice in man which says: "this is right" and "that is wrong." From a biblical standpoint, conscience is:
Witness: Romans 9:1: "I say the truth in Christ I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit."
Does conscience prove that there is God?
Yes, because it presupposes "someone who" will reward good actions and punish bad actions.
How does God differ from man?
God is a Spirit. He is Everlasting, Perfect, Infinite, Creator, and Master of all things. Man has a body, he dies, he is not perfect, etc.
Why do we say God is a Spirit?
We say God is a Spirit because He has not a body. But as people could not understand Him, they thought of Him as having a body, like a man.
Where is God?
Because God is a Spirit, He is everywhere. He is Ever-present.
Does God see everything?
Yes, God sees everything-the past, the present, the future, and even all our secret thoughts.
What else is God?
God is agape (love). He is also Almighty, Merciful, Righteous, Unchanging, Immortal, All-Wise, Self-sufficient.
Does God care for everything?
Yes, God cares for everything. He governs with righteousness, with wisdom and kindness. This is what we call Divine Providence.
What is a Mystery?
A Mystery (i.e., a secret) is a Truth of God that we cannot fully understand but must believe it. It defies explanation and understanding. It cannot be proved by any means except through faith.
Which are the chief Mysteries of the Christian faith?
The chief Mysteries of Christianity include the Mystery of the Holy Trinity, the Mystery of Incarnation, the Mystery of Redemption, the Mystery of Resurrection, and others.
What does the Mystery of the Holy Trinity mean?
The Mystery of Holy Trinity means that in God, there are Three Divine Persons, really distinct, yet equal: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
What is the soul?
A soul is a spirit that has understanding and free will and never dies.
Why do we say that the soul is the "image" of God?
We say that the soul is the "image" of God because the soul is also an intelligent spirit and free and it never dies, as God never dies.
Are we sure that we have a soul?
Yes, because, otherwise, without a soul, we could think no moral or good things and we would not have willpower to act freely.
Why did God make us?
God made us to know Him, to serve Him and to be happy with Him forever.
When did God make the first man?
God made the first man after He previously prepared His earthly abiding place (i.e., the Universe).
How did God make the first man?
God made the body of the first man with earth and then He breathed His spirit (a soul) into that body.
Did God abandon man after his first sin?
God did not abandon man after his first sin; He promised to send down someone who would save him.
Who was that?
He was Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the Son of the Living God, who was made man.
(Source: A Catechetical Handbook of the Eastern Orthodox Church)
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"Glory Be To GOD For All Things!" -- Saint John Chrysostomos
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With sincere agape in His Holy Diakonia (Ministry),
The sinner and unworthy servant of God
+Father George