Catholic theology has Christ everywhere…in Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, not just aware of everything, but in everything…in an apple, an atom, an angle…inside our head, our will, our ideas. This principle is called divine omnipresence, and the Christ who creates is part of every creation. The free, online 1912 Catholic Encyclopedia gives a good explanation under the heading “God, attributes of”:
“…God is really present everywhere in creation, not
merely in virtue of operation, but in virtue of essence. In other
words, God Himself, or the Divine nature, is in immediate
contact with, or immanent in, every creature — conserving it in
being and enabling it to act.”
Everything has at least the attribute of being. God’s attribute of being resides in creation. If a thing does not have being, it ceases to exist, and this being can only come into creation from God. God may use nature, or humans, or dominions and principalities, but these pass on God’s attribute of being which he donates to creation. Divine omnipresence gives these were part of God’s plan for humanity, but they all came about in some manner from human sin, which corrupts the original perfect spiritual framework of creation. In Heaven we will clearly see the profound results of every act.
It is interesting to note that St. Pio (Padre Pio), said that he believed the Italian dictator Mussolini had been saved. Mussolini was a pioneer in the use of chemical weapons against civilians…but also had half a nation praying for him.
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existence to everything regardless of its moral standing. Even those in Hell are sustained in existence by God.
This idea was written of by Doctor of the Church, St.
Thomas Aquinas, (Summa Theologica, first part, question 8, article 1;); he went so far as to say God has a non-moral presence even in demons; they were created as angels with the attribute of being, and as devils they retain this non-moral attribute of being, if not they would cease to exist. The idea also appears in scripture (Heb 1:3 Col 1:17, 1Cor 8:6).
NDE visitors to Heaven speak of God as being everywhere, and in all things, and as all things; even things we think of as nonliving.RRR This conforms to the Catholic idea of Heaven, and all in Heaven as being the living person of Christ.
We observe here the difference between creation and Heaven; RRR We should not mistake divine omnipresence for pantheism, which some NDE visitors do. Pantheism has God as everything; divine omnipresence has God inherent in, and sustaining everything. NDE visitors sometimes observe the presence of God sustaining earth for example, and label this as the goddess Gaia. This again is NDE mislabeling of Christian theology. It is a Catholic understanding that principalities, dominions and the like (Col 1:16) are tasked by the Trinity with governing nature. In Ephesians 6:12 we learn that, like the angels, some of these heavenly powers became corrupted.
St. Henry Suso observed the former angel of speech, now as the devil controlling blasphemy; our choice of speech is a moral decision and we are not forced to share in such corruption. Other attributes affected by the corrupted principalities are more non optional in nature: reason, love, sexuality are non optional parts of our being, and they have been damaged by the fallen principalities who distribute these attributes to each person and generation. This is one way in which original sin is propagated and shared in by each generation of humanity.
Beyond divine omnipresence is the Catholic idea that Heaven and the resurrection is the very person of Christ, (Jn 11:25). Still beyond this is the final form of the universe when “God will be all in all”, (1Cor 15:28). This will be the completed goal of Christ to attain fullest union with his creation. Hell, of course would be the spoiler to complete inclusion of creation into Christ.
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God is present in all of creation, but is the entirety of Heaven.
This makes sense, with the person of Christ being the whole of Heaven.
Mellen-Thomas Benedict was given to understand, “All energy and spirit is light. Everything is made from the light of God.” This is a fine impression of the omnipresence of God.40
This observation of God as all, is an observation of Heaven, not creation (which is not God). NDE truths must be sifted from their general statements.SSS
Rahmaan was a self described atheist, but God offered his help to Rahmaan during his NDE. The omnipresence of God was a major theme, and Rahmaan’s NDE is included in this section. The following are select passages of God speaking to Rahmaan.
“This world is formed in God's mind. God is increasing His experience by creating this world. This is what needs to happen based on divine laws, so Creator has meaning and becomes stronger.”
“Creation is a necessity of God's nature. When there is a God, creation will exist naturally which is the result of God's love for His creation and the creation's love for Him, which are necessary for each other. ”63
SSS “Everything is made from the light of God”, is true. All of creation was once a part of God, and God constituted the entire universe; God could not use existing matter or spirit to create because God was all there was.
Everything is necessarily constructed from the mind and being of God, either directly or by God’s workers. Even if God uses a second party to create, God must first create this second party from his own substance. This is the idea of divine omnipresence, not that we are God, but we are created from the substance of God. God withholds his divinity from al parts of his creation, therefore God and creation are not the same.
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The first paragraph has creation being formed within the mind of God, and so it is. In considering this idea, remember that God’s mind is no way confined to a physical brain, and every entity exists only because of the thought and will of God. Where
ever anything is, there too is God’s mind. A being is anything that exists, and “where” there is a being, the idea of that being must also exist, hence God’s mind is present in all things, Rahmaan (correctly) reverses the order and says; “This world is formed in God's mind.” Even if God uses a second party in all this, the second party must be created and sustained by God’s mind and will.
The idea that God is increasing his experience by doing is plain enough, and we should not be surprised that it applies to God. God is not a pre-existing storage location for his many attributes: the Trinity, creation, virtue, logic and so on. These exist first as Godhead (essential, undifferentiated, singular, divine God). Godhead differentiates himself into specific traits as he wills it, and this NDE has God saying that it is a real development.
Catholic dogma teaches that the Son of God is begotten from God the Father, and the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. The Trinity of God is not just some sort of static unveiling but a real development internal to God. Rahmaan was a self described atheist and would be unlikely to devise these ideas, God must have indeed spoken to him.
Continuing, the idea that creation “gives meaning to the creator”, could be restated as “the act of creation gives fulfillment to God the creator”. There are many fulfillment parallels in our own lives and such human fulfillment exists because it existed first within God.
Finally we observe that human creation is likely one of God’s more sophisticated projects, and he uses the experience gained from his nine prior creation projects. There are at least nine orders of created moral beings prior to humanity: seraphim, cherubim, thrones, dominions, powers, principalities, virtues, 92
archangels, angels, (these beings are in fact extraterrestrial beings).TTT
Humanity alone is native to the physical dimension, and this seems to give us a lesser direct awareness of God, than the seraphim for instance, who are continually in the presence of God. God’s nine prior projects, perhaps required less sophistication and experience than our universe which draws matter out of spirit and energy, rather than existing in God’s native substance of spirit.
Like many other NDE patients, Rahmaan gained the idea that God was all, and all was God. This idea is not Catholic doctrine and is not the idea of divine omnipresence. If God is light, he is not the light of an atomic bomb or a horror movie, God is not a murderer or a despot, or even a good person of imperfect faith, although God has a presence in all these. The difference between God and any human person is obvious.
TTT The Catholic Church confirms the existence of intelligent extraterrestrial beings, with these nine species being those known. If this list is in order of creation, with Seraphim being created first and angels, then humans last, then Hell might be late in the order of creation, coming into existence with the angels, near the end of the current creation list. This has a certain logic, with the Seraphim created with great awareness of God. Humanity is the first known creation in the physical order and this necessarily makes for a more remote awareness of the spiritual God. The angels, who rebelled may also have been more remotely aware of God, increasing the likelihood of their rebellion. God’s increased experience in creation projects (as suggested in Rahmaan’s NDE), may have prompted him to such a remote creation project, including some mechanism of redemption (Jesus Christ).
With nine creation scenarios prior to humans, we cannot be certain that humanity is the last project. God loves projects and reserves the right to make more. Perhaps humanity is the twentieth creation project with nineteen prior to it, and another twenty after. Some of these other species may even explore the galaxy in their spaceships, just as we do. Who knows how many species of creation make up the “great cloud of witnesses” (Heb 12:1), always observing us.
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The Catholic idea of divine omnipresence does have God’s actual but partial presence in every person, place and thing, but God alone is God. Divinity and eternity are two of his attributes that God withholds from his creation, thus the difference between God and creation. God alone is the necessary being and the eternal being.