Is it possible to prove the existence of God by reason?
At this point, Western theologians diverge
with some Eastern theologians. The first Vatican
the Council reaffirmed a long tradition of scholastic authors who developed arguments extensively to prove that
God exists. The “ways” of St. Thomas Aquinas
have become famous. Everything in the world is in motion.
Where does any movement come from? Always from one
initiative. And the next one from the previous one
etc. etc. To claim that this continues indefinitely,
would not be an explanation, but a rejection of an explanation. Yippee
therefore, it must be assumed that there is the first immobile mover – God. Similar evidence applies to
all other things that we observe or think about. Some thing is less perfect
than the other, some more. This means that in the beginning there is a completely perfect being, the sum of all good and
and beauty – God.
And yet there are several Orthodox authors who
they deny that this evidence would be able to prove its existence
God. It hides the object of revealed faith, not logical
thought. How to resolve this disagreement? It’s coming
about a misunderstanding. It is first necessary to determine what we mean by the word “God.” If it denotes the first cause of the universe and of human thought, supreme perfection,
which is the condition of every good and beauty, then in this
sense, it can be proved by human reason that it must exist. After all, the vast majority of humanity thinkers admit it. It is something else if we want the word “God”
to denote our “Father who is in heaven”. God
in this sense, Jesus Christ revealed to us, and he is the object of the Christian faith.
It is necessary to accept faith in true divine fatherhood
Holy Spirit and love. Because of this in Byzantine
ceremony of the deacon before the prayer of the Creed turns to the faithful
with the following challenge: \u201cLet us love one another
could confess unanimously “and a prayer follows:
“I believe in one God the Father Almighty.”
We can illustrate this difference in attitudes with an interesting fact. In the days of the atheist regime, which
prevalent in Eastern countries, a Dictionary was published
atheism, which was to fight unscientific superstitions. In the password
“God” was the following definition: “Mythological being,
which her faithful believes will hear their prayers
and to which they can turn in their needs. It’s not
it is therefore a scientific concept. “
Believers felt offended when there was a religion
presented to children in school in this way. But
Surprisingly, the definition was not so misleading if it did
she did not want to present in a polemical way. Annoying
we just have the word “mythological creature” because
in modern language, the term “mythology” means a narrative of things we do not believe in. But “myth” originally
it simply means everything we know from the narrative,
what others have revealed to us. After all, in this way we receive faith in God the Father – from the revelation of the church and not
from some “scientific” evidence, from pure reasoning.
Is it to his detriment or to his benefit?
In Christian families, parents are first
“Revelators” of this faith. One Slovak writer
wrote a short story entitled Who owns the sun. He tells
about one little boy from a very poor family. You are
however, he did not realize that he was poor because they lived happily.
He only discovered it at school, where others considered him
poor. So he asked his mother, “Why are we poor?”
His mother explained to him: “Because we don’t own ours
house, because it’s not ours either \u2026 “The boy was stunned because he didn’t know it yet. But in the end he laid it down
one last crucial question: “And is it beautiful sun?”
His mother’s answer made him happy at that moment:
“The sun belongs to a good God.” It was a revelation of divine fatherhood that strengthened him throughout his life.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Is it possible to prove the existence of God by reason?At this point, Western theologians divergewith some Eastern theologians. The first Vaticanthe Council reaffirmed a long tradition of scholastic authors who developed arguments extensively to prove thatGod exists. The “ways” … Continue reading