2. Why?
Plato and Aristotle from The School of Athens by Raphael Sanzio
The philosophers, ‘lovers of wisdom’, search for true knowledge through reason.
3. Why?
The meaning of life refers to the most fundamental
reasons for the existence of the world and ourselves.
KEY DEFINITION
5. Why?
Philosophers who discovered profound truths about
God, the soul and the world.
Plato
who focused on the more spiritual
world of ideas, characteristically
points upwards.
Aristotle
who discovered the truth
of things from what we
know in the world, points
downward to the ground.
6. Why?
As a child grows up, the
most persistent question he
or she will tend to ask is
‘why?’ As human beings we
not only ask what things are
but also why they are.
The Greek philosopher
Aristotle said that this desire
is universal, “All people by
nature desire to know!”
7. Why?
The question ‘why?’ can also
be applied to the whole
universe and to human
beings. Why is the universe here?
Why are we here? What is the
goal of human life?
Men and women throughout
history have attempted to
answer these questions.
8. What is the ‘first be-cause’?
The hands of man and God from The Creation of Adam by Michelangelo
9. What is the ‘first be-cause’?
All the things we see in the universe
are caused by other things.
Many thinkers have concluded that
this chain of causes cannot go on
forever. There must be a ‘first be-
cause’, a necessary, eternal and
unchanging ‘first cause’ which
creates and sustains everything.
This first cause is what people
naturally call ‘God’.
10. What is the ‘first be-cause’?
In addition, the universe shows
evidence of many processes that are
ordered towards things of great
complexity and beauty.
This order and goodness encourages
belief in a God who created them.
Question the beauty of the earth, question the beauty of
the sea ... question all these realities. All respond: ‘See,
we are beautiful’. Their beauty is a confession. These
beauties are subject to change. Who made them if not
the Beautiful One who is not subject to change?
St Augustine, Sermon 241 (ccc. 32)
11. What is ‘God’?
The image of God from The Creation of Adam by Michelangelo
12. What is ‘God’?
‘God’ is what people
rationally call the first cause
and purpose of things, …
… but to think that there is a
God raises questions about
what God is and God’s
relationship with us.
13. What is ‘God’?
For Aristotle, ‘God’ was the unmoved
mover. For Plato, he was the
unchanging good. For Anselm, he was
‘that greater than which nothing can be
conceived’. For Newton, he was the
architect of the laws of nature.
All rational models of the cosmos also
require a ‘first be-cause’. Einstein, for
example, often referred to the first
cause of the intelligibility of the
universe using the language of ‘God’
or the ‘mind of God’.
14. What does creation teach us about God?
The Garden of Eden by Jacob de Backer
15. What does creation teach us about God?
From what has been created,
we can learn that God is:
• One
• All powerful
• All good
• Unchanging
16. MISTAKES ABOUT GOD
Polytheism
Denies the one God in favour of
many ‘gods’.
This is wrong since there can only
be one first cause; several gods
would introduce chaos and
unintelligibility into creation.
What does creation teach us about God?
17. MISTAKES ABOUT GOD
Pantheism
Denies that God is distinct from
the world.
This is wrong because the first
cause is unchangeable, unlike all the
other beings of creation.
What does creation teach us about God?
18. MISTAKES ABOUT GOD
A powerless ‘god’
Denies that God is all-powerful.
This is wrong because the first
cause must have the power to cause
everything in creation.
What does creation teach us about God?
19. MISTAKES ABOUT GOD
An evil ‘god’
Denies that God is good.
This is wrong because what God
has created is good. Evil in the
world always refers to the
corruption of some intrinsically
good thing.
What does creation teach us about God?
21. Summary
Activities Menu Presentation Part II
• The meaning of life refers to
the most fundamental reasons
for the existence of the world
and ourselves.
• ‘God’ is what people naturally
and rationally call the first
cause and purpose of things.
• From what has been created,
we can learn that God is one,
all powerful, all good and
unchanging.
22. Questions to reinforce key points
Through the need for a first ‘be-cause’
Through the order and beauty of the universe
What are two of the ways
we can know the existence of God?
Activities Menu Presentation Part II
1
2
Click on a box to reveal one
of the answers
23. Discussion questions
Activities Menu Presentation Part II
• Discuss what are the most
convincing reasons for belief
in the existence of God.
• Discuss some personal
experiences of coming to the
knowledge of God.
Select one or more of the following:
24. Practical activities
Activities Menu Presentation Part II
• Read Romans 1:16-25 and/or
Wisdom 13:1-19 about the
knowledge of God from creation.
Spend some quiet time afterwards in
prayerful reflection.
• Obtain and read through the five
arguments for the existence of God
that St Thomas Aquinas gives in his
Summa Theologiae I q. 2 a. 3.
Select one or more of the following:
25. What are Human Beings?
The Creation of Adam by Michelangelo
26. What are Human Beings?
Human beings differ from
all other living beings on
earth. Although we are
animals, we also have the
capacity to know and to
communicate intelligently
using language. Aristotle
calls us ‘rational animals’.
27. What are Human Beings?
The kind of knowledge we
have is also unique.
Our knowledge is not just
sensory perception and
habit, but the knowledge of
what and why a thing is.
Without this capacity we
would have no science or
philosophy
.
28. What are Human Beings?
Human beings also have a
unique ability to choose.
This ability gives rise to an
enormous variety of
human work and action,
both good and evil.
29. What are Human Beings?
Many philosophers have
realised that the kind of
being who knows and chooses
in this way must have some
quality which cannot simply
be reduced to mere material
subject to change and decay.
They therefore infer that we
have immortal souls that do
not perish when we die.
31. What are Human Beings?
This picture highlights the nobility of the human creature and the
possibility of the gift of a personal relationship with God.
The figure of woman
close to the eternal
heart of God
Adam and Eve created perfectly
Their physical beauty mirrors the beauty of their souls created in God’s image.
The fingers of God and man
meet between heaven and earth
showing that man’s nature is both
physical and spiritual.
32. What do we want?
The Conversion of St Augustine by Gozzoli
Augustine, who had searched for fulfilment in many worldly ways, heard a voice telling
him to take up and read the Scriptures. He discovered the true way to happiness.
33. What do we want?
We all want to live happily; in the whole human race there is
no one who does not assent to this.
St Augustine, De moribus eccl. I, 3, 4 (ccc. 1718)
People seem to want many different
things in life.
However, when the deeper question is
asked about what we really want, St
Augustine answers that in all things
we are really searching for happiness.
34. What do we want?
We therefore look for happiness.
Proper happiness is something
complete, fulfilling, pleasurable,
and permanent.
Although in this life we experience
many partial and temporary joys,
none of these truly bring happiness.
Furthermore, there is much pain and
suffering in life, and our bodies
decay and die.
35. Where is happiness found?
The heavenly joy of angels and men from The Last Judgment by Fra Angelico
36. Where is happiness found?
Given our mortality, together with
much suffering and discontent in
life, it is clear that permanent
happiness is impossible for us
without some help beyond ourselves.
Even though our souls may be
immortal, we lose everything else
when we die.
37. Where is happiness found?
Knowing that there is a good God,
human beings have rightly looked to
God to fulfil their hope for happiness.
Furthermore, as naturally religious
beings it is clear that happiness must
involve knowing God as the first cause
and reason for all things.
You have made us for yourself and our hearts are restless till
they rest in you.
St Augustine, Confessions, I.1.1 (ccc. 30; c.f. 1718)
38. What does God offer us?
“Behold, I stand at the door and knock.”
Christ at the door of the soul from The Light of the World by Holman Hunt.
39. What does God offer us?
Christianity affirms God’s goodness
and desire for our happiness. In Jesus
Christ, however, God offers us what
is infinitely greater: a sharing in his
own divine life and happiness.
God, infinitely perfect and blessed in himself, in a plan of sheer
goodness freely created man to make him share in his own
blessed life.
Compendium of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, question 1
40. What does God offer us?
Due to this higher calling, God never
allows us to be satisfied with anything less.
It is only by responding to this invitation of
friendship with God that we also find our
natural happiness and fulfilment.
St Paul speaks of this great gift and
promise as follows:
What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart
conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him.
1 Cor 2:9 NRSV
41. What does God offer us?
‘Evangelium’ is the Latin word
for ‘good news’ or ‘gospel’.
The good news of Christianity
is that God has made it
possible, through Jesus Christ,
for us to enjoy this new life and
be happy with him for ever.
42. What does God offer us?
This course, also
called ‘Evangelium’,
has been written to
enable people to
know and grow in
this new life.
These are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God,
and that believing you may have life in his name.
Jn 20:31
44. Summary
Activities Menu
• Human beings differ from all other living
beings on earth in their capacity to
understand and to choose freely.
• This indicates that human beings are not
merely material but also spiritual and
endowed with an immortal soul.
• All human beings seek happiness but are
unable to achieve this by their own efforts.
• In Jesus Christ, God offers us a sharing in
his own divine life and happiness: this is
the good news of Christianity.
Concluding Prayer
45. Questions to reinforce key points
We know what and why things are
We make moral choices
We have language
How do human beings differ from
all other living beings on earth?
Activities Menu Concluding Prayer
1
2
Click on a box to reveal one
of the answers
3
46. Discussion questions
Activities Menu
• Discuss the unique qualities of human
beings that point to the spiritual aspect
of our nature.
• “We all want to live happily.” Discuss
whether St. Augustine is right that we
all seek happiness.
• Discuss whether human beings are
good at finding happiness and how the
search for happiness is linked to God.
Select one or more of the following:
Concluding Prayer
47. Practical activities
Activities Menu
• Read the Compendium of the
Catechism questions 1-5.
• Read psalm 90, pausing after each
line for a short moment of
prayerful reflection.
Select one or more of the following:
Concluding Prayer
48. Final Prayer
From Psalm 138
O Lord, you search me and you know me, you know my resting and
my rising, you discern my purpose from afar. You mark when I walk
or lie down, all my ways lie open before you…For it was you who
created my being, knit me together in my mother’s womb. I thank
you for the wonder of my being, for the wonders of all your creation.
Already you knew my soul, my body held no secret from you when I
was being fashioned in secret and moulded in the depths of the earth
… O search me, God, and know my heart. O test me and know my
thoughts. See that I follow not the wrong path and lead me in the
path of life eternal.
Amen.
