Can We Prove God Exists?

[00:00:00] Speaker A: I would say with respect to St. Thomas, and this is probably why, or one of the reasons why the church has considered him a model is that he takes faith seriously and he takes reason seriously. And that is, I think, what the church teaches we should all do. We should take faith and reason seriously. [00:00:25] Speaker B: Welcome to the Catholic Theology Show, presented by Ave Maria University. This podcast is sponsored in part by Annunciation Circle, a community that supports the mission of Ave Maria University through their monthly donations of $10 or more. If you'd like to support this podcast in the mission of Ave Maria University, I encourage you to visit avemaria.edu join for more information. I'm your host, Michael Dawfinay. And today we are joined by Professor Joseph Trabek, professor of Philosophy at Ave Mar University. Welcome to the show. [00:01:01] Speaker A: Thank you, Michael. It's great to be here. [00:01:03] Speaker B: So I thought it would be great today to deal with, I think, one of the most basic questions, which is are there grounds for believing in the existence of God? [00:01:15] Speaker A: Yeah, right. [00:01:16] Speaker B: And I know that you've made kind of this a little like an area of study sure. Written articles and working on books on this topic about the proofs for the existence of God and where do they fit in with respect to theology. Where do they fit in with respect to philosophy. But I thought before we kind of jump into that, I wanted to kind of just set the stage a little bit. And Bishop Robert Barron. In 2019, he did a reddit AMA. Ask me anything. It ended up being, I think, the third most now, his was the second most popular after Bill Gates, and he was ahead of Bernie Sanders, by the way. So he had over 15,000 comments. [00:02:02] Speaker A: Wow. [00:02:03] Speaker B: And he said he identified four major themes that came up. And obviously this is a very just kind of worldly group in reddit that's talking to him. And he said, number one, the question of proving God's existence came up again and again. Are there rational grounds for believing in God? How do I know there is a God? Can God's reality be demonstrated to someone who does not believe in the Bible? [00:02:32] Speaker A: Right. [00:02:32] Speaker B: And he says one of the fascinating things is that people were showing that they were interested in the question of God and they weren't dismissing it as merely kind of self gratification or projection. People were taking it seriously. And yet at the same time, he also said that it's almost within our cultural assumptions. Most people still have the idea that God's existence can be known only by faith. And this is not the teachings of the church. But so if this is one of the biggest questions in talking about the faith, how would you begin to answer that? Why is it important to talk about how we can come to know God by natural reason? [00:03:22] Speaker A: Right. Well, I think it's important because we need to see that our faith has, as you were saying, a rational grounding. Right. It gives us a certain confidence in our faith. Of course, faith is a supernatural gift. It's a grace that we get from God. But we also can work at strengthening our faith. Right. And one of the ways that we do that is by reasoning about it and trying to understand what justifies this faith. Right. And the proofs for God's existence are one way that we do that. And I would say that they're relevant to everybody, but that doesn't mean that everyone needs to know them or be able to work them out for themselves. But it's helpful for our faith to know that there are these proofs and that people can work them out in the way that I would say analogous to if I'm taking medicine, it's good to know that there are people who've run tests to show that the medicine is safe and effective. Right. I don't have to run the tests myself, but it's good to know. It gives me confidence in taking the medicine. Right. So I think there's something analogous there to the proofs for God's existence and how they relate to our faith. Right. I don't need to be able to work them out for myself, but it's important and it's helpful. It strengthens my faith in a way to know that there are these proofs and that there are people who know them and can work them out. Yeah. [00:05:03] Speaker B: And in Paul's letter to Romans, chapter one, verse 20, paul writes this ever since the creation of the world, god's invisible nature, namely his eternal power and deity, has been clearly perceived in the things that have been made. So this idea that somehow God's power and His Godliness, his divineness, his identity as the Creator, is somehow visible, I mean, is seen in the visible works of the world that the works of the world do not explain themselves, sunsets do not explain themselves, and how can we see them and why do we understand them? And then how can we write equations about them? We can write equations about sunsets with respect to the nature of the sun, the chemical reaction that makes the sun, the optics and the nature of light and waves. It's like all this is intelligible. So I think also there is this basic presupposition in Scripture is that the Creator is knowable through the creation. [00:06:21] Speaker A: Yes. [00:06:22] Speaker B: So what would you say, in a way, then, what is it further that the proofs tell us? [00:06:29] Speaker A: Yeah. Well, first of all, I want to make a comment. It's important to see that this is something that we also find in Scripture. Right. Because sometimes you hear people say that we can only know God by faith. Right. Well, Scripture itself teaches us that we can. And St. Paul here in Romans teaches us that we can know God by reason. And we even have Paul, perhaps drawing also on the Old Testament book of Wisdom, also has a similar teaching. So I think that it's important to see that this is not simply something that we've come up with apart from revelation, but revelation itself also teaches us that God is knowable through reason. So I think this is an important point. Yes, we can say that the way that I think of it sometimes, and this is not original, but I think it's important to see this is that in a way, there are kind of two revelations, right? There's a natural revelation of God that we have access to just by our own powers as human beings, our cognitive powers, our mind, right? And there is then, in a way, a second revelation, what we would call a supernatural revelation that we have access to not by our natural powers, but by faith, which is again, a divine grace. But these two are from the same God, right? They're from the same God, right? And so he's just revealing it's the same God revealing Himself in two different ways. And I think that's important to see that because another problem that people have sometimes with arguments for God's existence, the proofs is that they say what they do is create idols, right? This is man trying to know God apart from God. But that's not really true. And St. Paul shows that in the letter to Romans, he's saying, no, God Himself has already, in a way, revealed Himself in his creation and given us reason so that we can know Him in a way that's analogous to the way that he gives us faith so that we can know Him in the supernatural revelation. [00:08:53] Speaker B: And Paul goes on to say, so we are without excuse because we could know the Creator through creation. Therefore we are without excuse when we worship created goods. So we are the source of idolatry, not the knowledge of creation. [00:09:11] Speaker A: Right? [00:09:12] Speaker B: One of the things I want to do is talk a little bit about just kind of maybe just how many different proofs there could be and then maybe a little bit about how your own background, how you got interested in studying philosophy and studying the proofs. And then I definitely want to spend a little time maybe going through one or two proofs really kind of carefully, maybe that might kind of be illuminating to our listeners and viewers. So first, if this basic idea that we go from creation, we can discern the Creator, then in a can, all the different proofs are just looking at different parts of creation. So you can think about maybe newman makes an argument from moral conscience. C. S. Lewis repeats the same argument in different ways. In the first part of mere Christianity, from the moral law, there must be a lawgiver. There must be a source of the moral law. And then you have other arguments from sometimes called cosmological arguments or arguments that are kind of our observation about the created universe that then points to something beyond the created universe. Arguments from order and design, arguments maybe from change of motion. Why is there something rather than nothing? All these different things? Could you maybe when you are teaching these topics, just kind of in general, are there any kind of just among all the different kind of proofs, are there any ones that you find people are surprised about? [00:10:48] Speaker A: I don't know if they're surprised. I standardly go through St. Thomas's five arguments in the Summa quite often. I preface that by going over St. Anselm's argument, because St. Thomas, which is called he didn't call it this, but St. Anselm's argument is called an ontological argument for God's existence, right? So it argues from the concept of God to God's existence. And I usually begin with St. Anselm because St. Thomas is critical of this approach because he thinks that the way that we can know God by reason is through his effects in creation. Right? And then as I write, there are these five arguments that he gives in the Summa, but he gives if you look at his other writings, there are I don't know if we know the exact total, but at least 40 or possibly 50 different arguments. Now, some of them are the same kind of arguments just sort of put in a different way. But there are 40 or 50 different places in his writings where he makes arguments for God's existence. But, yeah, that's St. Thomas, as you were mentioning, there are other people who have made arguments. Cardinal Newman, good example, makes the argument from conscience. C. S. Lewis as you're pointing out, I mentioned St. Anselm. There are many different ways that we could argue for. It wasn't just something that people were doing in the Middle Ages arguing for God's existence. Right. Newman lived in the 19th century. C. S. Lewis in the 20th century. And in the early modern period, we have people like Descartes who were also proposing arguments for God's existence. Right. So there are a lot of different arguments, and people have been making them for centuries. [00:12:49] Speaker B: So maybe tell us a little bit about yourself. How did you get interested in studying philosophy, studying Catholic philosophy, or at least philosophy that's kind of animated and carried out within a Catholic ethos? And then from that, how did you end up getting particularly interested in this question? [00:13:11] Speaker A: Okay. Yeah. Well, I began college as an art major, right. I didn't know anything about philosophy, and I discovered that maybe I didn't really know much about art either because I wasn't very good at it, or I was okay. Right. I was okay, but my classmates were a lot better. So I thought, well, maybe I should do something else besides art. And at this time, this is also a period in my life when I was beginning to take my faith more seriously. And I was reading Fulton sheen's autobiography, Treasure and Clay, beautiful book, reading about his studies in philosophy at Leuvain in Belgium. And I thought, wow, philosophy, this really sounds cool. Maybe that's what I should study. So, I mean, I wish I had kind of more I could say that, yeah, I really began to wonder about the world and so on, but it just seemed like a really interesting field of study. And so I thought, okay, I'm going to give that a shot. I'll give philosophy a shot. So I changed my major to philosophy, and yeah, I don't know how you can study philosophy as a Catholic and not also at some point study St. Thomas. Right. So I developed an interest in St. Thomas, and that interest continues to develop. Right. It's one of the main people that I focus on in my research and writing and teaching and yeah, the question of God's existence for me seems to be the most important question. Right. In philosophy, yes, there are other questions and there are other important questions, but that is the most important question. So just for that reason, because I see it that way, but I think that's also objectively true. I've always been drawn to questions about God's existence, God's nature and so on, how we relate to Him. Yeah. [00:15:19] Speaker B: So maybe we obviously on the Catholic Theology show, and at avimer University, we take Thomas as a model and guide for doing theology, as a kind of guide for doing philosophy, as FIAs Arazio speaks of and John Paul II and really the tradition of the Church. But I think there's also a little bit of maybe a skepticism about aquinas that aquinas, like, overly rationalizes the faith instead of kind of faith that begins in Jesus Christ and maybe the darkness of God on the cross or something along those lines. Quinas tries to make the faith overly understandable or overly where you end up in a kind of rationalistic conception. Did you ever kind of experience that in your own philosophical or theological formation? And if so, how did you overcome it? Or if not, how would you suggest that others kind of overcome that? Caricature perhaps? [00:16:30] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I have I was interested in St. Thomas, but I also sometimes had this kind of thought that, yes, maybe he's overdoing it with reason. And of course, there are plenty of people who make that criticism of St. Thomas. Right. Even other Catholic philosophers and theologians. But the more I read Thomas, the more I began to discover that it's not true. Right. Yes. He's taking reason as far as it can go. And I think that is something that the Catholic faith that the Church teaches we should do. We should see how far we can go with reason and knowing about God and knowing about the world and world's relationship to God. So he takes reason as far as it can go, but he's also aware of the limits of reason. Right. He's aware that God is a mystery. We can understand something about God. We can't fully understand him. Right? So Thomas has no problem saying that in a sense, God is incomprehensible, right? Because God is for one reason. Why he's incomprehensible is because he's infinite. Right? And we have a finite mind and we can understand some things about Him, but we can't understand Him to the extent that he can understand Himself. Right? So I think it's important to see that, yes, Thomas takes reason as far as it can go, but he's aware of reason's limits. But we should also say that Thomas is a man of deep faith. Right? Now, as you're reading the summa that may not come out, that might not be front and center, but you see that in his prayers, right? In the hymns that he wrote, you can see that this is a man who yes, he's a philosopher, he's a theologian, but he's also a man of deep faith. So I think those are important qualifications to make with respect to St. Thomas, I would say. And this is probably why or one of the reasons why the Church has considered him a model is that he takes faith seriously and he takes reason seriously. Right? And that is, I think, what the Church teaches we should all do. We should take faith and reason seriously. [00:18:58] Speaker B: Very nicely put. Maybe just to say one more thing before we jump into a couple proofs specifically. How is it that the proofs or thinking about God's nature are important for theology so that we don't end up with a false view of God, right? That we could say, I believe in God sincerely with all my heart, and yet it might turn out that I'm not believing in God, but I'm believing in a way in kind of I'm believing in simply what I think to be God. And that how is it that the proofs for God's existence also kind of act as a purification of that of some of those kind of human ideas about God? [00:19:48] Speaker A: Well, the proofs show us if we're able to follow them through. They show us what God must be like if the world is the way that it is. Right? And so we can be certain that God has this or that attribute. First of all, I would say we can be certain that God exists and then we can be certain that he's infinite, that he's eternal, that he is good and so on. And the certainty that we can arrive at can then help us to, when we're reflecting on how we think about God, what is right and what is wrong with sort of you could say our preconceptions of God. Right. So the proofs, as you say, can function as a kind of means for purifying our preconceptions about God. Yeah. [00:20:51] Speaker B: And I think it's Bishop Robert Barron again, who he has an essay called, I think, something like Thomas aquinas and why the atheists are right. What he means by that is he says that usually the atheists are thinking of a God who is kind of within a being within the universe, and therefore you shouldn't believe in that God because that God is not the Creator. And so to really think what it would mean to think about God not the highest thing in the universe, not Zeus, not Jupiter, not kind of this being within trying to control the universe in competition with the universe, but simply being itself that is present to every moment and every space within the universe in a non competitive manner. That the proofs, in a way, help us to eliminate by going from creation to the Creator, we eliminate any creaturely. Our tendency to kind of think about God in creaturely terms or to kind of picture where we kind of imagine God as again, kind of in competition with us. So in that sense, it's very important then to go through that kind of that spiritual exercise, the intellectual exercise of purifying our understanding of God and then in a way that allows then theology to work better. Grace and free will are no longer a problem because they're not in competition with one another. The two natures in Jesus Christ, he can be fully divine and fully human because they're not in competition with one. [00:22:27] Speaker A: Right, right, exactly. [00:22:28] Speaker B: And to a certain extent, that's kind of what the proofs, as we'll look at, help to show. [00:22:32] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I completely agree with that. Right. So there have been other theologians and philosophers that have pointed this out, have made a point similar to Bishop Barron's, that yes, if quite often what atheists are denying is not what we understand to be God. Yes. Right. And this is whatever you think of anselm's ontological argument, this is an important point that he makes. Right. He says, okay, well, this is how we should understand God, right? This is what God must be. If he's God, if you're thinking of Him in any other way, then that's not God, that's an idol. Right. And so if you claim to be an atheist, then you have to get your concept of God right first before we can talk. [00:23:25] Speaker B: Yeah, right. So Anselm says for people who may not be familiar with the idea that God is that than which nothing greater can be thought. [00:23:31] Speaker A: Right. [00:23:31] Speaker B: So whatever you're thinking about, then you have to then think about something greater than that and then thinking greater than that. And that would be then you would be kind of almost approaching this infinite Creator. So let's take a quick pause, okay? And then when we come back, let's dive into a couple of these specific proofs. [00:23:51] Speaker A: Okay, great. [00:23:52] Speaker B: Thank you. [00:23:53] Speaker A: Sure. [00:24:01] Speaker C: You're listening to the Catholic Theology Show, presented by Ave Maria University and sponsored in part by Annunciation Circle. Through their generous donations of $10 or more per month, annunciation Circle members directly support the mission of AMU to be a fountainhead of renewal for the church through our faculty, staff, students and alumni. To learn more, visit avemaria.edu. Slash join. Thank you for your continued support. And now let's get back to the show. [00:24:30] Speaker B: Welcome back to the Catholic Theology Show sponsored by Ave Mar University. I'm your host. Michael dauphine. And again today, we are here with Professor Joseph Trabeck to talk about proofs for the existence of God. Thanks again for being on the show. [00:24:42] Speaker A: Thank you, Michael. [00:24:43] Speaker B: So we've been kind of discussing a lot of the I would say setting up the issue, setting up the question, what the proofs? Do, what they don't do, how they can help us both have more confidence in our faith and also to make sure that we're kind of purifying our faith to really believing in God as the Creator and not a part of creation. So I'd love to now just let's jump into maybe two proofs, if we can, with our remaining time and kind of go through them. So which one do you want to start with? Which one do you think is maybe. [00:25:15] Speaker A: I was thinking about. So the one I would like to start with is the first of the five ways in the summatelogia. So this is if you have your summa talogia at home, this is Prima par's, question two, article three. And this is the first argument. And Thomas says that this argument is the most or he first speaks of them as ways, right? But they're not just ways to God. He understands them to be demonstrations. He understands them to be capable of giving us certitude about God's existence, right? And he says that this first way or proof is manifestior, which means, he says it's the most manifest way. Now, people, commentators don't always agree about what he means by that. In what way is it the most manifest? Is it the most manifest for everyone or for people who've read Aristotle or for a certain group of scholars? It's unclear. But I do think that it is once you understand the terms, I think it is in a way, the simplest of the proofs. Proofs. Maybe he says that it's the most manifest because it begins with something that's so obvious and what it begins with is change, right? Now the Latin word is motus, which we could translate as either motion or change. I think change, it doesn't really matter because it works either way, but I prefer to translate it as change. And so what Thomas is saying here is that we're all aware that things change, right? I mean, it's going on all the time. Things are changing, right? The air temperature is changing, my coffee is getting cold, I'm moving my hands, my mouth is moving, right? Change is always taking place, right? So we're all aware that there's change. And Thomas wants to say, well, yes, and this also if we think through what's required for change to take place becomes a proof for God's existence. Now, that might be a little surprising. How can change explain God's existence? Right. But I'm thinking that maybe this is why he says that it's most manifest, because change is so obvious. Right. What might not be so manifest is then how change leads us to God. Hopefully, I can try to say a few words that explain why we should think that change leads us to affirm God's existence. Yeah. [00:28:22] Speaker B: And maybe you could also say a word about change, because I think and you can correct me if I'm wrong, but often when we think of change, we tend to think of things falling apart. And I think that's at least often in the idea, like change is when things we build and then they fall apart. That's what change is. That's why we don't like like generally change we tend to think of as something bad, where, as it seems to me in part, one of the phenomenon or just the realities that Aquinas is drawing upon, is that change is often a sense of growth, right? That acorns change into trees. Trees bear fruit and make more trees. Animals are, when they change by reproducing and then having little animals, they grow into big animals. And so what we see over time is this thing of growth, right? Yes. That when things change, they're actually growing and becoming more of what they are. So they're, in a way, right. Do you think that is important? [00:29:36] Speaker A: Well, yeah. [00:29:37] Speaker B: In his mode of understanding, yes. [00:29:39] Speaker A: I mean, that is a form of change. And in a way, it's the most important kind of change because it leads to the perfection of the world and our own perfection. But he would say that change of any sort can be evidence for God's existence. Right? So a minute ago, I said my coffee can go from being hot to being cold, right? That's a change. My heart changes, right? It's not sitting there immobile in my chest. It's pumping blood, right? So it's undergoing change. I'm speaking right now, as I said a bit ago, my mouth is moving. So that's change too, right? It's not just there immobile, but it's moving, which is a form of change. So Thomas would say that any kind of change, whether it's of the positive sort that you're talking about or something that we might say is negative, can function as evidence for God's existence. But we have to understand how to see how that works. We have to understand what he means by change. And Thomas says that change is the movement of something from potency to act. Now, let me explain what that means. So if we take my coffee, for example, right? My coffee, let's say it's hot right now. It could be cold, but it's not cold right now. So Thomas would say it has a potency to be cold, but it's not actually cold. At the moment, right now it's actually hot. Right. So when it becomes cold, what happens is that a potency, a capacity that it has, becomes actualized, right? Sure. So it goes from being in one state hot to being in another state cold. That is a movement from potency to act. And it's what takes place in any kind of change, right. Something goes from being potentially in one state to actually being in that state. Right. That is what change is fundamentally. And it's understanding change in that way. That is Thomas's starting point to then developing this first argument in the summa for God's existence. [00:32:08] Speaker B: So how then if things move from the capacity to change to the actuality of having changed, what does that have. [00:32:17] Speaker A: To do with right, right. So Thomas says, okay, so if something is in potency, in a state of potency with respect to a certain way of being to another state, it can't actually get into that state by itself because it's in potency. Right? Potency is not act. So for potency to become act, something else that's already in act needs to move that thing from potency to act. Right. So if we go with my coffee again, what makes my coffee get cold? Well, it's the room temperature, right? It's the ambient temperature. So that temperature is, let's say, already, I don't know, 70 degrees, it's going to affect my coffee in such a way that its potency to be cold goes from being a potency to being an actuality right. Because the temperature of the room brings the temperature of the choir down. Sure. Yes. Right. So anything that changes and therefore moves from potency to act needs to be moved by something else that's already in act to be an act. Right. So anytime a change takes place, the thing that has changed is changed by another. Thomas okay, right. So then we have to ask ourselves, well, what, what would ultimately explain that change? Would it be something else that is itself changed by another? Well, no, because that doesn't ultimately explain the change in the first thing, because that thing too depends on something else to change. So the only thing that could adequately explain why this initial thing is changing is not something else or a bunch of other things that depend on something to change, but something that doesn't depend on anything else. Right. And can bring about change in everything that changes. And this is what Thomas calls the unmoved mover. [00:34:26] Speaker B: So in a way, the unchanged changer, in a way based upon the language you're. [00:34:34] Speaker A: Says. And this is what we call God, right. So God is the unchanged changer, as it's usually translated in English, it's the unmoved mover. And Thomas says this is what we call God. Okay. So you get to that point, you say, okay. And so Thomas says, therefore God exists. Right. That's the conclusion that he wants us to come to. But then we might. Ask, well, why should we think of this unmoved mover as God? And Thomas doesn't in those proofs. He doesn't give us a lot of explanation for that. It comes a little later in the Summa in what we call the Treatise on the Divine Nature. And we see that, well, if God is this first cause of change, then he must have these other attributes as well. And once we see what these attributes are, we begin to see, well, okay, well, yes, this must be God, because if he is this first cause, then there's nothing that he's subject to. He is the first cause that there is. Right. He also must be outside of time. He must be infinite. We see that all these things can be concluded by understanding Him as this first unmoved mover. Right. To really understand what those proofs get us to, we have to then go through some of the considerations in the Treatise on the Divine Nature to see that, okay, yeah, of course. This is what I would mean by God. Yeah. [00:36:05] Speaker B: So for students who might be more familiar with the questions, in order to understand question two fully, you have to go through questions three through eleven where Quinas kind of unpacks. That exactly. Well, I mean, we could talk about that proof or the argument from change promotion further, but I'd love to just kind of throw in another one. Okay. And what might be a second kind of somewhat self contained proof that might be interesting or that you at least enjoy yourself and enjoy teaching. [00:36:37] Speaker A: Yeah. I think he has another argument in one of his first works. So he wrote the Five Ways in probably the mid 1260s. One of the first things he wrote is a treatise called On Being in Essence in Latin de Ante at the Sensia. That was probably the mid 1250s, when he was in Paris. And there's an argument there for God's existence in the third chapter, and it goes like this. Thomas says that if there is something that exists whose existence doesn't belong to its essence, and therefore it gets its existence from some outside cause, then there must exist some first cause that is the ultimate source of that thing's existence. And that first cause must, if it's to adequately explain the existence of this first thing, must not be such that its existence is given to it by something else, but that it must be such that its existence belongs to its essence. Right. Now, okay, that's very abstract. [00:37:56] Speaker B: You say what do you mean by, say, existence and essence in that? [00:38:01] Speaker A: Right. So the essence of a thing is what it is. It's nature. Right. [00:38:06] Speaker B: It's like, I'm a human being. [00:38:08] Speaker A: Yes. [00:38:08] Speaker B: I have human nature. [00:38:09] Speaker A: Exactly. Right. And existence is we could say there are different ways of talking about it, but one way to put it is to say existence is the fact that you are here, the fact that you occur, the fact that you're present. Right? [00:38:26] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:38:27] Speaker A: And Thomas says that we know that there are beings whose existence doesn't belong to their essence. Right. So their existence, in a way, comes to them from the outside. [00:38:40] Speaker B: So, like, I am a human being, but I came to be when I. [00:38:45] Speaker A: Was. [00:38:47] Speaker B: Don'T to be human doesn't mean to. [00:38:51] Speaker A: Exactly. Yeah. So and that's that's one of the ways that we can see what Thomas is talking about, because he says, well, the difference between a non existing person, a non existing human being, and an existing human being is not their nature. They have the same nature. Right. The difference is existence. [00:39:11] Speaker B: Okay? Yeah. [00:39:13] Speaker A: So we can understand what a human being is. We can understand its nature. But we see that understanding what a human being is doesn't tell us that it exists. So that shows us that existence is not a part of our nature. So there's at least one being, human beings, whose existence is distinct or comes to them from outside their nature. But there's another, easier way to see that this is the case. If existence belongs to me by nature, then I will never cease to exist. Right. I'll never come into existence. I'll just always exist because it belongs to my nature to exist. Yes. Right. So I know that existence doesn't belong to a thing's nature when that thing is destroyed or when it dies. Right. Because if existence belonged to its nature, it would never cease to exist. Right. So that's kind of easier, more evident way that we can tell that existence doesn't belong to a thing's nature. Yeah. [00:40:14] Speaker B: So, like, bunnies come to be and then they cease to be. [00:40:17] Speaker A: Exactly. [00:40:17] Speaker B: Right, exactly. If that's the case, then what would it mean then to say that there would have to be then something or that God would then be it would belong to God's nature to be. What does that tell us in a way, about God? [00:40:37] Speaker A: Well, first of all, let's think about, like with the other argument we're talking about. If we have something that we know its existence is distinct or comes to its nature from the outside, we can't adequately explain its existence by other things that are also like that, because what explains their existence? Well, the only thing that can adequately explain the existence of all these things would be something whose existence belongs to its nature or essence. Right. And what would that mean? Well, it would mean that this is a being that always exists and that can never cease to exist. Right. So it would be a being that is eternal. Right. And that's what we understand God to be. Right. We understand God to be an eternal being. But we could also say that this being is pure being or pure existence. And what allows us to say that? Well, we can't add things onto existence. Right. There's nothing outside of existence to add on to it. So if something has existence by its nature, then there's nothing else that would have to be a part of its nature or that could be a part of its nature besides existence. Right. So this thing must be pure existence and therefore have the power to do or to make whatever can exist. Right. What does that tell us? Well, it tells us that this is an omnipotent being. Right? And that is another attribute that we think of God as possessing. Right? So eternal omnipotent. And since the being always exists, never ceases to exist unchanging. Right. So this is beginning to sound an awful lot like God, right? Yes. [00:42:37] Speaker B: And maybe there too, I think, the idea that I think sometimes I think when I first started thinking about these terms, or sometimes when I work with students, people tend to think of existence as stuff they can touch. So existence is like a rock or something. But existence is in some sense most fully displayed in life and in mind. So when we talk about God being infinite, unchanging, we're also talking about God being alive, most fully alive, as Thomas will talk about. And so, again, to have the fullness to have being itself is also to have the fullness of being which would be to contain within God's self all the perfections that are somehow present within creation, which includes us not just dirt and stars, but also the human being. The capacity to know, the capacity to love, the capacity to wonder at beauty. So one kind of maybe just how would you bertrand Russell, who's a famous atheist, he objected to these arguments by, you know, who made this? Somebody made that, somebody made that, somebody made that. So then God made all of that. [00:43:49] Speaker A: Right. [00:43:50] Speaker B: And then he said, well, what about who made God? [00:43:52] Speaker A: Right? [00:43:53] Speaker B: And he always thought this was a really good answer. Right. How would you respond to that question? And how does that kind of show a lack of understanding of Aquinas's proofs, as you've just described two of them. [00:44:05] Speaker A: Right. So let's go with the second proof, the one where we get to God as having existence belonging to his essence. Nothing could bring such a being into existence, right? Nothing would need to, because this is a being that always exists. So to ask, where did this being come from? Well, apparently you haven't understood what we're talking about when we say this is a being whose existence belongs to its essence and therefore always exists. It doesn't need and couldn't have a cause. [00:44:44] Speaker B: That's very well put. I think one time, I think actually, if you read some of Bertrand Brussels'writings, he'll actually say that the argument is that everything needs to be put in motion by something else, and therefore God would need to be put in motion by something else. But that's not what aquinas begins with. Everything that is in motion, everything that is in change needs to be changed. By another. That doesn't tell you whether or not there is a being that is not in motion or in change or changed by another. So the argument works as long as you don't kind of play fast and. [00:45:20] Speaker A: Loose with the and then and so it's important to see if we go back to the argument from motion or change. Thomas doesn't say everything is changing. [00:45:30] Speaker B: Yes. [00:45:31] Speaker A: Therefore there must be some first cause of change. He says there are things that change, there are some things that change. He's not saying that everything changes, but yeah, you're right. And Russell, I think, is not the only one who has assumed or read into Thomas a different yeah. [00:45:51] Speaker B: So, you know, as your professor and I think it's a great opportunity maybe for listeners to kind of get to listen into the classroom. When you do teach a class on, say, metaphysics or proofs for existence of God, what are two things that you'd like students to remember five years from now? Like if they could just kind of take away one or two themes, what would be the key takeaways? [00:46:12] Speaker A: Well, studying, first of all, I would like them in a metaphysics class to have a decent understanding of at least one of the proofs, right. So I mentioned different proofs in the class, but we don't try to go through every single one of them because, well, first of all, we don't have the time, but second of all, we're not going to go into enough depth in each one that they'll really be able to understand it. So if we cover five of them, they may not remember any of them. Right. So I'll give a kind of overview and then focus on one or two of the proofs, right. And then we will go into more depth. And so my hope is that they retain some of that after graduation as they go on with the rest of their lives. And why? Well, because they can have a sort of first hand knowledge that there are these proofs and that they do work and that their faith has this rational grounding. Right, that's one thing. But also to have a good understanding of some of the more central divine attributes, I suppose we could say. So not to have an understanding of God that's not God as we were saying before. Right. Not to have this idol that's really Zeus, but not the God that we believe in. As yeah. So I would say those are the two things that I hope they take away from metaphysics class. [00:48:01] Speaker B: That's so well put. And I know sometimes even it's funny, once you begin to see the proofs, you can't unsee them. In a way, I find it's just like studying geometry when you were like in 9th grade or something, until you figure out how to prove it, it's hard. But then once you do, it's like just all there. And I think also that one of the things that I find, even just my own experience, is that the very fact that I ask the question, like the very fact that I ask the question of, does God exist? Why does God exist? How does God exist? Who is God? And that my logos, my reasoning asks that question is already a sign that I am more than matter. [00:48:45] Speaker A: Yes. [00:48:46] Speaker B: And in a way, I don't want to say that the specific arguments are important, but that alone reminds me that there must be a God, because I certainly didn't make my own logos. [00:48:57] Speaker A: Right. [00:48:57] Speaker B: So where does it come from? It comes from God. So I just kind of shared that, too. Even it's like the mere fact, even if you cannot understand one of these proofs yes. The mere fact that you're confused about it is almost already a sign that there's something in us that is non material. [00:49:15] Speaker A: Exactly. [00:49:16] Speaker B: But as we close, I like to ask our guests three questions, just three quick questions. What's a book you're reading? [00:49:26] Speaker A: Well, does it have to be a philosophy book? It can be anything. [00:49:29] Speaker B: Comic books are awesome. [00:49:32] Speaker A: Well, right now I'm reading Dorothy Sayers Lord Peter Whimsy mysteries. Right. Some short stories. She wrote detective novels and short. Yeah, yeah. [00:49:44] Speaker B: She was a famous kind of Anglican apologist, kind of alongside of, but wrote detective stories. That's great. And what's a daily practice that you try to incorporate to find meaning and kind of become more aligned with this truth that we have revealed in the faith. [00:50:05] Speaker A: Lectio divina. I try to start every day by reading a passage from the Bible, usually the reading the gospel for the day at Mass and meditating on it for at least five minutes. Right. If I can go longer, great. But usually I don't have a whole lot of time, so if I can just do that and have that sort of personal prayer time at the beginning of the day, I try to do that. [00:50:34] Speaker B: Try to wake up before the five kids. [00:50:36] Speaker A: Exactly. [00:50:37] Speaker B: And last question. Is there a belief that you held about God that you discovered in a way to be false? And what was the deeper truth you discovered? [00:50:53] Speaker A: I can't think of any right now. Was there a belief that I held about God that was false? Probably. [00:51:02] Speaker B: Well, maybe. What's one truth that you in your studies or in your own faith journey that really kind of was a turning point for you? [00:51:11] Speaker A: Well, I suppose seeing that God is both knowable, not to be too paradoxical, but knowable, but also unknowable. Right. Knowable but a mystery. Right? Yeah. But in in a way, you can only see that by going as far as you can with reason. You can see it in a more elementary way, but you can really appreciate it by going as far as you can with reason. Right. Because then you see what the limits of reason are. Right. [00:51:48] Speaker B: Well, thank you so much, Dr. Joseph Trabick, for being on our show. Listeners and viewers may find it interesting to follow some of your articles that you publish frequently on Catholic World Report. [00:52:01] Speaker A: Catholic World Report. [00:52:02] Speaker B: That's right. And also, at some point, there'll be a book on the Aquinas's proofs for God coming. [00:52:10] Speaker A: I hope so, yeah, I've been working on it for a while, but, yeah, it will take some time. Excellent. [00:52:16] Speaker B: I'm sure you'll have a lot of interested readers. [00:52:18] Speaker A: All right, thank you. [00:52:19] Speaker B: So thank you very much for being on our show. [00:52:20] Speaker A: All right. Thank you, Michael. [00:52:23] Speaker C: Thank you so much for joining us for this podcast. If you like this episode, please rate and review it on your favorite podcast app to help others find the show. And if you want to take the next step, please consider joining our Annunciation Circle so we can continue to bring you more free content. We'll see you next time on The Catholic Theology Show.