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Was Heaven really created or has, like God, always existed?
Topic Started: Saturday, 7. April 2012, 15:12 (681 Views)
Derekap
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An awkward thought occurred to me a day or two ago.

In the Apostles Creed we say: "I believe in Almighty God, Creator of Heaven and earth.... and something similar in the Nicene Creed.

We believe God always existed and always will. Therefore surely Heaven always existed?
Edited by Derekap, Saturday, 7. April 2012, 15:13.
Derekap
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Anne-Marie

God has always existed. Heaven has not. Nor have its occupants, the angels and, more latterly, the saints.
God does not need Heaven for Himself (as I understand it), but more for those who join Him.
When I were wee thing, the nuns taught me God is everywhere, here, there, Heaven, etc.
Heaven being not everywhere was not needed till there were others created and joining Him.

Must admit, I hadn't given it much thought till now, either....
Edited by Anne-Marie, Saturday, 7. April 2012, 15:25.
Anne-Marie
FIAT VOLUNTAS DEI
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Rose of York
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What a conundrum!

Heaven is the presence of God. God is with God, so he doesn't need to go to Heaven,

The Father is with the Son and the Spirit

The Spirit is with the Father and Son

The Son is with the Father and the Spirit

therefore every one of the three persons who IS God is WITH the other two who are both God. If all three existed before Heaven, they were in no place. Being pure spirit they have no need of a place.

Does that mean Heaven is a place, made for our first parents and their descendants? If so it is big enough to hold all the bodies of those who died in a state of grace and eventually rise again. I trust it will be bigger than the other place. If all the dead rise again, there must be two places.
Keep the Faith!

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Rose of York
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1* IN the beginning God created* the heavens and the earth.

The beginning was the moment time began. God existed before time. God lived before he made Heaven. If Heaven had, like God, always existed, that would mean it was not created. If it was not created how come it exists?
Keep the Faith!

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Angus Toanimo
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I thought Heaven was enjoying the Beatific Vision? In which case, surely the Beatific Vision has been in existence as long as God has.
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Rose of York
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Patrick
Saturday, 7. April 2012, 18:28
I thought Heaven was enjoying the Beatific Vision? In which case, surely the Beatific Vision has been in existence as long as God has.
That is what I thought, but:

I believe in Almighty God, Creator of Heaven and earth.

How do we explain that?
Keep the Faith!

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OsullivanB

Can there be a vision if there is no-one to see it?
"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance - that principle is contempt prior to investigation." Herbert Spencer
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OsullivanB

I don't think the Creed is talking about Paradise in the phrase "factorem caeli et terrae". I think it's entirely concerned with the material world. Caelum is the heavens - what's up there, sky, stars, planets. Terra is the earth - what's down here.

Amyway, I don't think Heaven has been "made". It's not a place.

"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance - that principle is contempt prior to investigation." Herbert Spencer
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Clare
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Putting the "Fun Dame" into Fundamentalist
OsullivanB
Saturday, 7. April 2012, 21:03
Amyway, I don't think Heaven has been "made". It's not a place.

Our Lord and Our Lady are physically somewhere.
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OsullivanB

Not necessarily. They were corporeal when they left earth. Since then I'll leave the question of what and where they are to God.

Otherwise we fall into the trap of answering the (possibly apocryphal) materialistic observation of the Soviet cosmonaut who reported no sighting of God or other supernatural phenomena when in space.

However, I was only trying to explore what the troubling phrase in the Creed is intended to convey.
"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance - that principle is contempt prior to investigation." Herbert Spencer
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PJD

"God has always existed. Heaven has not. Nor have its occupants, the angels and, more latterly, the saints.
God does not need Heaven for Himself (as I understand it), but more for those who join Him.
When I were wee thing, the nuns taught me God is everywhere, here, there, Heaven, etc.
Heaven being not everywhere was not needed till there were others created and joining Him.

Must admit, I hadn't given it much thought till now, either....
Edited by Anne-Marie, Today, 2:25 PM."


I agree with your observations Anne-Marie.

Personally I think the answer may well lie in that, although God existed before He created anything outside of Himself, He would still be aware of what He was going to create. I think it is called pre-venience; but not sure.

So although say 100 years ago you did not exist, you existed even at that time (and before) in the Mind of God. A priest explained that to me, which was some comfort (to my intellect I suppose) that He was aware of me before my mother got together with my father.

Happy Easter to you all after that!

PJD
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Angus Toanimo
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I guess a similarly difficult question would be:

What did God get up to before He decided upon Creation? Did God get bored one day and decide to create the Universe etc?
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Home in Rome
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Patrick
Saturday, 7. April 2012, 23:23
I guess a similarly difficult question would be:

What did God get up to before He decided upon Creation? Did God get bored one day and decide to create the Universe etc?
The way Christians have understood the origin of the universe is that God - who has always existed and is self-sufficient in every way - wanted to share his life with others - his creation, esp men and women whom he has created in his own image. So it was God's love that made him undertake a risky work of creating something out of nothing (ex nihilo), and endowing men and women with free will, so that we may be free to love him and not conditioned to do so willy-nilly.

As for the origin of heaven, it's meant to be a place where we will experience that perfect unity with the Trinity in a bond of eternal love. So it's part of creation, where the purpose of God's creation will be fulfilled. We cannot locate it in a definite time and space, because that perfect unity with God cannot be attained in this life but only in afterlife when we are freed from the limitation of time and space. But we are privileged to experience 'heavenly' moments in this life - when our soul is lifted up to get a foretaste of heaven. We are using human language to describe something that is essentially supernatural, but the reality of heaven must be clear for all believers as their ultimate destination beyond the grave.
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paul

Why did God have to rest on the 7th day?
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Home in Rome
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paul
Saturday, 14. April 2012, 18:26
Why did God have to rest on the 7th day?
Didn't have to.
The Bible says simply that God rested - presumably to leave us a legacy and a lesson - as repeated in the Decalogue - that we are to spend one day in seven in rest, recuperation and worship.

Modern biblical scholarship would say that the Genesis account of the creation contains an aetiological explanation for the institution of sabbath observance.
Edited by Home in Rome, Saturday, 14. April 2012, 20:04.
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