The Existence of God PDF

THE EXISTENCE OF GOD Necessary: ✰ cannot not exist; independent: existence → Faith alone cannot prove the existence of depends on itself; permanent; eternal; exists God....

THE EXISTENCE OF GOD Necessary: ✰ cannot not exist; independent: existence → Faith alone cannot prove the existence of depends on itself; permanent; eternal; exists God. in eternity. → Our faith must be based on sound reason → There must be something or NECESSARY BEING, existing in eternity who causes → Rational foundations and arguments that contingent things to exist, otherwise, nothing will somehow strengthen our faith in God. will exist. Theist – someone who believes that God exists The only thing that has always existed is God, If God did not exist, nothing else would. Agnostic – someone who believes that the existence of God is unknown or unknowable ARGUMENT FROM GRADATION Atheist – denies the existence of God DEGREES OF PERFECTION ✰ Judging something to be more or less perfect. FIVE WAYS OF GOD’S EXISTENCE (St. Thomas Aquinas) There is a standard that is used for the said evaluation. ARGUMENT FROM MOTION ✰ There are external causes of change; Gradation or degrees of goodness and perfection: something which is in actuality moves ✰ Things are compared on basis of that which something with potentiality. possesses the perfection in maximum ✰ Whatever is moved is moved by another, but it is absurd to go on infinitely. There must be a perfect being. – which every else is ✰ There must be One who is unmoved and measure unchanged, the Unmoved Mover or the First Mover. ARGUMENT FROM GOVERNANCE ARGUMENT FROM EFFICIENT CAUSE DESIGNED ✰ The universe filled with things that exists ✰ All things are planned and made to work ✰ Everything that exists has a cause. perfectly according to their purpose. ✰ Effects have causes We behave and act according to that purpose. ✰ There must be one who caused everything to be – END and to exist but not caused by anything, the Uncaused Cause, the First Efficient Cause. - Everything in the world is in balance and moves a being that causes all. accordingly and for purpose. CHAIN CAUSES OF EFFECTS DESIGNER We cannot go “ad infinitum” --- infinite regression - ✰ Cannot be possibly humans or other natural CHAIN OF REASON beings themselves ✰ HUMANS are imperfect and not intelligent ARGUMENT FROM NECESSITY enough to grand design. Contingent: DESIGN ARGUMENT ✰ cannot exist; dependent: existence depends ✰ Teleological Argument (telos: purpose). If we on something else. look around us at the natural world, we can’t ✰ Created and corrupted = can exist and not help noticing how everything in it is suited to exist. the function it performs: everything bears ✰ THERE MUST HAVE BEEN A TIME THAT THEY evidence of having been designed. HAD NOT EXISTED AT ALL, WHICH MEANS ✰ This is supposed to demonstrate the existence THAT NOTHING EVER EXISTED. of a Creator. CWINETTE THE WATCHMAKER ANALOGY ✰ Benevolent (Good or Loving) ✰ William Paley (1743–1805) Why is He indifferent to man? ✰ Just as by looking at a watch we can tell that it was designed by a watchmaker, so, they ✰ Omniscient (All-knowing) argue, we can tell by looking at the eye that it Why can’t He prevent evil from happening? was designed by some sort of Divine Watchmaker. It is as if God has deliberately Atheism left evidence of his or her existence all around ✰ From Greek ‘A’ – ‘not’ and Theos – ‘God’ us in the world. ✰ The doctrine of disbelief in a supreme being FINE TUNING ARGUMENT Existentialism ✰ The fact that human beings have evolved and ✰ “Existentialism’s first move is to make every survived provides us with proof of God’s man aware of what he is and to make the full existence. responsibility of his existence rest on him ✰ God must have controlled the physical because of man’s anxiety, existential conditions in our universe and fine-tuned movement had desired for stable human them to allow just this kind of life form to condition.” In other words, the existential evolve. attitude is a straightforward reaction against the swift dehumanization of man, brought by THE GAMBLER’S ARGUMENT: PASCAL’S WAGER the phenomenon of angst. ✰ Its aim is not to provide proof, but rather to show that a sensible gambler would be well THE REVOLT OF EXISTENTIAL ATHEISM advised to ‘bet’ that God exists “Atheistic existentialism, which I represent... states that if God does not exist, there is at least one being in whom existence precedes essence, a being who exists before he can be defined by any concept, and this being is man, or, as Heidegger says, human reality.” – Jean Paul Sartre “EXISTENCE PRECEDES ESSENCE.” Sartre’s philosophical camp of existentialism becomes THE PROBLEM OF SUFFERING an invitation to re-examine human life. Sartrean atheism is a philosophy born of despair... The feeling of anxiety Two Types of Evil and loss that is marked by this philosophy is rooted in fear. Physical Evil – Consequences of natural events or phenomenon “In order to overcome anxiety and despair, we must become a single individual by constantly choosing to be Moral Evil – Evil due to man’s abuse of freedom ourselves and not somebody else.” Being the sovereign maker of himself, man has the power to become The Problem of evil has been the center of debate since someone because there is no God who gives purpose to the time of the Ancient Greeks and even up to our the universe. contemporary era. For this existence of evil is not compatible with the existence of an all-powerful God. RESPONSE TO THE PHENOMENON OF SUFFERING AND THE DISTORTION OF EXISTENTIAL ATHEISM Attributes of God One way to characterize suffering is to see it as an evil. ✰ Omnipotent (all powerful), Thomas Aquinas would say that evil is a privation of Why can’t He control the evil in the world? good. In other words, evil is an absence. Whatever lacks goodness is evil. We suffer because there is lack. CWINETTE  1. The problem of suffering does not constitute a disproof of God’s existence. ✰ In the light of Thomas Aquinas, all created beings are changing. The world is created so it is subject to change. Accordingly, whatever in motion entails imperfection. Our finite cosmos is in the state of motion, so it follows that it is in the state of imperfection. 2. God is like a surgeon who operates on us and knows best on how to heal us. – C.S. Lewis ✰ The entire surgical procedure is painful, but we will be alright at the end. If God stopped in the middle of the surgery, then all those pains that we bear are worthless. 3. The consequences of eliminating the phenomenon of suffering in the world. ✰ It is a great misleading notion that if suffering in the world is eliminated, the only fruit will be good. But we must bear in our minds that suffering is not completely bad at all. Besides, if God will remove all the pains and sufferings in this world, it is more chaotic. 4. If the world is freed from all physical evil and if all human suffering will be eliminated, and if God created a perfect world, man will be entering into the realm of the self- a perfect total universe. ✰ Our attitude in questioning the existence of God whenever we experience human anxiety and suffering is just an attitude to bend reality into our own. There are deeper and justified reasons why suffering exists. The problem is that we are too blind so we cannot see. It is true that suffering exists and has dreadfully affected the whole human race. But we are called once more to climb the valley of life and to see the perfect landscape that God has prepares for us. The world is not our home. This imperfect cosmos is nothing compared to the paradise of God. CWINETTE