Is Your Striving For Perfection Authentic?

Is Your Striving For Perfection Authentic?
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Many Christians strive for perfection, following the teaching of Jesus: "So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect." (Matthew 5:48).

But we have to ask ourselves: is our perfection authentic or is it something we merely imagine to be perfection? What is true perfection that is pleasing to God?

We can ask: is our perfection a help and a consolation to others or is it a burden and a sorrow to others?


Jim McCrea
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What is Meant by a "Mystery of the Faith"?

What is Meant by a "Mystery of the Faith"?
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By Jim J. McCrea


In the past, priests and catechists talked about "the mysteries of the Faith," which we do not hear discussed much in those terms any more.

This phraseology was commonly used when there was a greater sense of the supernatural - a greater sense of transcendence in the Church - and when the Mass evoked the feeling that the liturgy transported us to a higher world.

What do we mean by a mystery of the Faith?

There are mysteries such as the Trinity, the union of a human nature with the person of the Son within the Trinity, the Eucharist, the Mass, divine providence, and the coincidence of the justice and the mercy of God.

It is commonly believed that a mystery means that we have no idea how such a thing can be - that, for example, we cannot know how three persons can exist in one God. However, from a logical perspective, we can know how such can be, as in the Church accepted explanation here of how three persons can exist in one God and how Jesus can be God and man at the same time.

To accept mysteries of the Faith is not to accept irrationalities (and many unbelievers charge us with that when a mystery of the Faith is misunderstood). We can (in most cases) show that they logically fit together. I propose here how Jesus can fit into the little host, and I offer my solution here as to how the existence of evil is compatible with the omnibenevolence and the omnipotence of God.


This does not mean that they are not mysteries. There is a very important aspect in which they cannot be grasped by the human mind on this earth. They are knowable in one respect and unknowable in another respect. They are what are termed intelligible mysteries.

They are unknowable in the sense that we cannot know them as they are in themselves. But, at the same time, they are knowable because they can be understood by analogy.

What does this mean?

Let us look at God as God. God as God is a mystery. In this life, we do not know Him as He is in Himself (except perhaps partially by mystical illumination, not by our natural intellect). But we can know Him by analogy. When we say He is intelligent, knowledgeable, good, loving, powerful, beautiful, etc. we are applying what we experience as intellect, knowledge, goodness, love, and power, etc. to Him by analogy.

How does this work?

With analogy, two things are partly the same and partly different at the same time.

Let us look at the attribute of goodness that we apply to God.

We call both a person good and an automobile good. But they are good in entirely different ways. A person is good for love and an automobile is good for transportation. There is a sameness between them in that they have an identical metaphysical attribute of goodness, but a difference in that the modality or type of goodness is different.

It is the same with God. He has an identical metaphysical property of goodness with the person or the automobile, for when we say that God is good we are using a meaningful term. But the modality of God's goodness is infinitely different from the modality of goodness of the person or the car (or anything else we can know on earth). We cannot know that modality in this life. We do not know what God's goodness is in itself.

But because of the identity of metaphysical goodness that runs through all things that are good, when we say that God is good we literally and truly apply that attribute to Him. Similarly, when we say that God is intelligent, knowledgeable, powerful, loving, and beautiful, we say what is literally true, even if we cannot know the modality of those attributes in God. We are applying those terms to Him by analogy.

It is in the analogues that we have literal knowledge of God, but it is in the modalities that He is mystery.


It is the same with other teachings of the Faith such as the Trinity and the union of a human nature with a divine nature in Jesus.

We say that God is one being in three persons because the persons are distinguished from each other by their relations of origin alone. The Son is distinguished from the Father by the mere fact that He is begotten by the Father. In all other respects they are the same. By extension, the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit by the mere fact that He proceeds from the Father and the Son. If the persons are considered in themselves, apart from their relations, they are identical, hence they are one God. However, that analysis uses analogy. With that analogy, we can solve the riddle. But the Trinity is a mystery because we do not know to what the analogues apply in themselves. We do not know the modalities. We do not know the nature of God in itself (as explained above), and we do not know what it means for the Father to generate the Son in itself. But to say that the Father generates the Son is to say what is meaningful, because it is based upon the analogue of "generation" which we can know (the Nicene creed talks about the Son being begotten by the Father as "Light from Light")

Similarly, Jesus is God and man at the same time because a human body and soul were united to the person of God the Son, so that this body and soul is literally a part of Him (Jesus' body and soul have the person of God the Son instead of a human personhood as we do). In this life, we do not know that in itself. We cannot know, in itself, the union of a human body and soul to God the Son in that that body and soul is literally a part of Him. That is a mystery. But we do have literal knowledge that that is true because we know what "union" is and what "being part of" is. Those are analogues that literally apply to Jesus.

The same type of reasoning applies to the Eucharist and the compatibility of the existence of evil with the goodness and power of God.


This combination of knowability and mystery satisfies two deep needs of the human heart.

We want our Faith, on one hand, to be logical, rational, and intelligible; but, on the other hand, if reality were strictly confined to what we can know, it would be the most stifling of prisons. Happiness can only come by having something to look up to.



** End note - in heaven, the blessed there will see the modalities of those mysteries, or what they are in themselves, for their consciousness will have an extra dimension. But they will not be completely comprehended. There is a depth of penetration to them that the blessed cannot achieve. Only God can completely understand all things.


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How Can Jesus Fit Into the Little Host?

How Can Jesus Fit Into the Little Host?
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By Jim J. McCrea


A mystery of the Catholic Faith is not something we can know nothing about. It is something we cannot know everything about.

It is common to believe that the Trinity is a mystery in the sense that it is humanly impossible to understand how there can be three persons in one God.

This, and this type of view on other mysteries of the Faith, give fodder for unbelievers to charge us with holding absurdities that undermine the rational thought processes of the human mind.

However, with many mysteries of the faith, it can be rationally explained how such can be so. I give Church accepted explanations here as to how God can be three persons in one and how Jesus can be fully God and fully man at the same time. This has been understood by theologians in the Church for centuries.

They are still mysteries because there is a depth of penetration into them that the human mind cannot achieve, but we can show that they are fully rational.


Here, I will propose such a type of explanation for the Eucharist. In the Eucharist, the entire Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity exist within the appearances of bread and wine, when that bread and wine have been changed into Jesus, by the priest (as an instrument of the Holy Spirit), at Mass.

To do this, we must introduce some concepts in metaphysics (the science of being as such).

Consider a material object, such as an automobile.

First of all, it has *matter.* Matter is what something is made of. Then it has *form.* Form is how the matter is constituted to make the thing what it is. A material thing is not merely its parts or its matter. A heap of automobile parts, with all of them present, is not yet an automobile. They must be assembled the right way, thus adding form.

Form is the arrangement, interconnectivity, and distribution of the parts or matter in three dimensional space.

Here we introduce a third component - that is *essence.* With proper form, essence emerges.

When form is added to the parts or the matter of an automobile, it then has an intelligibility or "automobileness," which is its essence, which comes out of the form.  As a result, our intellects can judge what it is.

Then there is a fourth metaphysical component, which is *existence,* which means that it has a reality outside of nothingness rather than being a mere concept or possibility.

So a material thing has a quadrupole of matter, form, essence, and existence.


It is important for the following argument, regarding Jesus in the Eucharist, that form and essence are distinct - they are not one and the same.

Form is a mere mechanical distribution of matter in three dimensional space, while essence is its intelligibility.

An analogy may help to understand this. Letters on a page are a mere presence or absence of pigment at specific locations on that page. That itself is not meaning, for by itself it is merely spatial arrangement. However, meaning emerges from that in the reading that pattern. There is an intelligibility as to what is being said.


Now with the Eucharist, Jesus is fully present in the form of bread - and is fully present in each and every particle broken off (that is why, at Mass, the priest must be careful that when the Host is broken, the particles are not lost, and that is why in the past, when there was proper reverence for the Eucharist, a paten was used to catch the particles when Holy Communion was given).

How, then, can His Body fit into that tiny appearance of bread?

We propose here that with Jesus' body, matter, essence, and existence are present, but without form. That is, His distribution in three dimensional space, which would give Him His size and shape, are omitted (by the power of God).

We are saying here that with matter, essence, and existence, with form missing, a physical being can still be fully what it is.

Form is constructive of a physical thing (in the ordinary order of things), but is not strictly necessary for its proper constitution. Form is the condition by which essence emerges, but it is essence that makes a thing what it is. God can omit form and sustain essence and a  physical being would be perfectly what it is.

That is what I propose happens in the Eucharist.

The matter, essence, and existence of the Body of Jesus are fully present under the appearances of bread and wine, and thus He is fully and completely present there, and without having form He has the Eucharistic appearances.



** End note 1 - I define form here in a very specific manner, as a merely mechanical distribution in three dimensional space. Traditional scholastic philosophy has used the term "form" to mean essence. It is important to look at the definition of terms used here for this argument.

**End note 2 - The quadrupole matter, form, essence, and existence can be used to understand different things in Catholic theology. For example, angels have essence and existence, but not matter and form (therefore, they are pure spirits). God has essence and existence without matter and form, and essence and existence are identical with Him (therefore, God is the infinite spirit).



Also see The Eucharist and Metaphysical Being


The explanation of another paradox: how the existence of evil is compatible with the infinite goodness and omnipotence of God here.


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Why Does God Exist?

Why Does God Exist?
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By Jim J. McCrea


If it is given that God's existence can be demonstrated, what accounts for His existence.

Philosophers and theologians have said that God is self-existent, for the First Cause of all cannot Himself have a cause. This property of self-existence is known as aseity.

But on a more fundamental level, what would account for aseity?

I believe that the answer to this is found in the law of identity.

The law of identity is the most fundamental law of thought and reality, and thought and reality simply cannot operate without it. It states that a thing is what it is - A=A. This is not a triviality, but is a profound law when properly understood.

One consequence of this is that if a thing is what it is, it is not necessarily what you think it to be or want it to be. It has a determinant nature independent of the mind. The mind does not create reality but merely recognizes it. Because this truth is not properly acknowledged today, moral relativism is rampant. Wishing that something is right or doing something merely because it feels good is insufficient. For if certain immoral actions are harmful in themselves because they are contrary to human nature, reality will still assert itself and evil consequences will follow (because of the law of identity it is false to say that something is true for me and a different thing is true for you. A thing is either true or it isn't)

Another consequence is that a given thing is the same thing no matter what perspective you view it from or at what time you experience it. The ancient philosopher Heraclitus denied this principle in saying that everything was flux and change. His famous saying is: "you cannot step into the same river twice." However, with that human reasoning would become impossible.

Human reasoning requires the law of identity. Let us look at a classical syllogism:

P1: All men are mortal
P2: Socrates is a man
C: Socrates is mortal

We can see that the conclusion follows necessarily from the two premises.

That works because "man" in P1 and P2 have an identity between them (they are exactly the same thing), and "Socrates" in P2 and C have an identity.

Let us see what happens when identity breaks down. Consider:

P1: All intelligent beings can do mathematics
P2: My dog is intelligent
C: My dog can do mathematics

The syllogism here is not valid because there is an equivocation between "intelligent" in P1 and P2.

In P1, "intelligent" means the ability to think abstract concepts (such as the abstract concept of number); in P2 intelligent means the ability to cleverly respond to cues. The meaning of the same word is different in the two cases, so the principle of identity does not hold.

It is important that in order to reason correctly, we delve deeper than the words used in order to reach the underlying identity. Often debates cannot be resolved because the parties involved employ different definitions for the same word. For example, in arguing about freedom, one could define "freedom," on one hand, as the ability to do what one pleases, and on the other (what the I deem to be the correct definition of freedom), the non-hindrance in the pursuit of the true, the good, and the beautiful.

Now how does this relate to God?

What I say is that God is Pure and Absolute Identity - that He is the complete identity of all possible good things and existence itself - that the absolute playing out of A=A=A=A=A ... explains His existence and nature.

Here we have God's existence explained in terms of what we can fundamentally intuit as true - the law of identity.

With the understanding of God's existence as a fundamental expression of identity, God's classical attributes and effects can be deduced.

If He is Pure and Absolute Identity, He is absolutely simple - for everything in Him is absolutely identical. There is no distinction in Him, so that it is not true that one part of Him is not another part of Him (God being a Trinity does not mean that He has parts, as explained here).

Containing all that is good, God is the absolute fulfillment of the inhabitants of heaven. He brings supreme and complete happiness. All good things on this earth are but tiny reflections of God.

Containing all good, He contains all that is true, therefore, He is Pure and Absolute Intelligibility.

He is strictly infinite because He is Unrestricted Identity or Identity Itself.

We see that the law of identity is an ultimate law of thought and reality (if we are thinking correctly). As it is necessary, it is not a creation of God (as is a physical thing), but it does have its origin in God. God is Being Itself (His name is "I Am" - Exodus 3:14) and all other things are beings in finite modes. When God created, those things have a similarity to His nature, for He can only give what He has. Part of this similarity, necessarily conferred upon created beings, is the principle of identity. That is necessarily conferred because of the nature of being, and does not depend upon God's free choice.


If God contains "all," why God does not contain evil is explained here.


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A Wonderful Blurb in Our Parish Bulletin

A Wonderful Blurb in Our Parish Bulletin




Every Rosary increases Mary's power to crush the head of the serpent and to destroy his evil power in the world.

Join us for the recitation of the Rosary before each daily Mass!



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How to Pray Better

How to Pray Better
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To pray better, pray to pray better.

Pray that your prayer improves and becomes what it should be.

God is simplicity itself.


Jim McCrea

The Existence and Nature of God

The Existence and Nature of God

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By Jim J. McCrea

 

Originally published in the Iron Warrior in 1988 which is the engineering paper of the university of Waterloo

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Republished here with minor modifications

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Many people, both Christians and non-Christians, believe that God's existence must be held on faith alone. The existence of God and His main attributes, however, can be known by reason without the aid of revelation. This is established through a branch of metaphysics known as natural theology.

The existence and nature of God can be understood from the essence-existence dichotomy, which flows from the nature of being as such. The basic definition of being is that which is. The subject that refers to essence and the predicate is refers to existence. All beings, therefore, are a compound of essence and existence.

 

The essence-existence dichotomy is one of the most difficult principles of metaphysics to grasp; an example may help. If a watchmaker is to construct a watch, the essence of the watch or the "watchness" exists in his mind prior to its construction, but that essence does not exist in reality (essence is defined as "what a thing is"). When the watchmaker assembles the watch, he gives existence to the essence or "watchness." (existence is defined as "that a thing is"). Since the "what it is" can precede the "that it is" it can be said that essence and existence are principles that are formally distinct.

Since essence and existence differ, the concept of anything does not imply that it is. It can be said that all finite things that exist can possibly not exist. In this, they have what is known as contingency. A further analysis shows that essence has the form of a noun - it denotes "something" - and existence has the form of a verb - it denotes an "act." (we can call it "ising"). Now the act of existence of a contingent being requires a cause, precisely, because it is distinct from its essence. Nothing can be its own cause; therefore, it must have a cause extrinsic to it, and this cause we called God.

How do we avoid the obvious difficulty, which arises from the preceding argument that God Himself would seem to require a cause?

 

This difficulty is solved, first, by stating the nature that God must possess. The immediate statement that can be made about Him is that He is self-existent. While essence and existence are distinct in finite beings, the essence of God is His own existence. Since it is the nature of God to exist He is not contingent, but necessary. He cannot possibly not be. This property of necessary existence is known as aseity. It is His most fundamental attribute and is that from which His other attributes are logically deduced. The question: "why does God exist?" cannot be answered in the conventional manner because it has no meaning in the conventional manner. The identity of God's essence with His existence prevents this. He is the frame of reference against which all hows and whys are known.

What properties can be deduced from aseity?

 

If the essence of God is His own existence, He is Pure Being or Pure Existence, and therefore, must contain everything that being or existence can possibly imply. God, therefore, is necessarily unlimited, perfect, and possesses all positive attributes to an infinite degree. We can also understand, by looking at God's most fundamental attribute of self-existence, that the most fitting name that can be given to Him is He Who Is (or "I Am" in the first person - the name given in Exodus 3:14).

 

Two means of knowing God are by negation and analogy. Negation says what He is not and analogy says what He is. Any concept, which in itself, denotes an imperfection of any kind can be denied Him absolutely in negation. Any concept which denotes a perfection, pure and simple, can be attributed to Him, to an infinite degree, by analogy.

 

First of all, it can be denied that God contains matter because the concept matter necessarily implies passivity and indetermination, which are per se imperfections. It can be denied that He has form because any form is inherently limited by its definition. The simple name of God "He Who Is" rather than "He who is such and such" means that He is a universal principle which transcends all forms.

 

It can be affirmed that God possesses the attributes of infinite intellect and will. These are metaphysical perfections because intellect as intellect is the capability of apprehending truth without qualification, and will as will is the capability of being inclined to the good without qualification. Since intellect and will are the prime attributes of personality, we refer to God as He and not it.

 

It can be said that God is perfectly simple - that is, He has no composition of parts. This follows from the fact that He is an absolutely primary being. With anything that has composition, that thing must be referred to its parts and the principle of its composition for its explanation. That makes its parts and the principle by which it is composed in some manner prior to that thing. There cannot be anything prior to God, therefore, He cannot have any composition. It can be said that the only thing in God is God. A corollary of that is that the attributes of God are identical with Himself. The very intellect and will of God is God.

 

God does not exist in space and time because space and time are divisible and God is in no manner divisible. This rules out an anthropomorphic conception of Him, that some people have, that He possesses a human body and human type emotions. The book of Genesis talks about the reminiscence (Gen 8:1) and the regret (Gen 6:6) of God, but because they are metaphysical imperfections they can only be attributed to Him metaphorically (reminiscence is an imperfection because it is the bringing to mind something not thought at the time and regret is an imperfection because it denotes an error in judgment).

 

One very important point is that God is not the universe itself, as the pantheists hold. Although He is imminent in all things, in that He is infinitely close to them and sustains them in existence from instant to instant with His power, He is also transcendent - that is, He is unique and distinct from the things He sustains. We can understand this from the fact that the objects present to our reason and senses do not have the infinite perfections of God.

 

Although human reason can know the existence of God and many of His attributes, this knowledge has limits. We can only extrapolate from what we experience and understand (analogy is a term for intellectual extrapolation). We do not know, in itself, what it is for God to be intelligent, free, or good. This is why we also assign multiple attributes to a Principle that is necessarily one and infinitely simple. The human intellect is not subtle enough to grasp God through a single concept.

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** End note 1 - It says in the book of Genesis that God made man in His own image (Gen 1:26). This in no manner refers to physical likeness. The proper interpretation is that man has a share in the functions of intellect and will of God, which are the attributes of His personhood.

** End note 2 - If God has everything that existence can possibly imply, that would not mean that He also contains evil. This is because evil is not a type of thing or being, but is the absence in something of what would constitute its proper integrity.

 

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