Lonely God?

Picture God sitting somewhere up in the clouds.  Quietly, he sulks because he is all alone.  He breathes a heavy sigh and says, “What to do?  I’m so bored.”  Then a light bulb goes off in his head as he exclaims, “Say I know!  I’ll make some humans!”  Sadly, this perception of God is all too prevalent in many people’s minds today.  It can be a cause for criticism by unbelievers – and rightly so because it couldn’t be farther from what Catholics actually profess.  So where can we go to get the right answers to questions like “why did God made us?” 

There have been many brilliant thinkers in the two-thousand year history of the Church that have contributed to the way we comprehend reality and our faith.  This is not to say the truth about God is changing.  God has fully revealed himself through Jesus Christ once and for all – but our understanding of this revelation continues to deepen throughout the years.  Fathers, mothers, priests, religious, scientists, kings, and young people each have uniquely enriched the deposit of faith.  In addition, the Church has always drawn from the tradition from our very respected Jewish fathers in the faith as well the insight from the secular culture such as in Ancient Greek philosophy.  All of this has been gathered together and complied into a document known as the Catechism of the Catholic Church.  It states clearly what every Catholic throughout the whole world believes and why.  Let’s look at the first paragraph together.

“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.  For this reason, at every time and in every place, God draws close to man. He calls man to seek him, to know him, to love him with all his strength.  He calls together all men, scattered and divided by sin, into the unity of his family, the Church.  To accomplish this, when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son as Redeemer and Savior.  In his Son and through him, he invites men to become, in the Holy Spirit, his adopted children and thus heirs of his blessed life.” ~CCC 1

Did God create man because he was lonely?  Absolutely not!  God is infinitely perfect and blessed in himself.  Then why?  Out of a plan of sheer goodness.  This is a bold statement.  It means to say that God has absolutely no need of us.  All creation overflows from the perfect love that God is: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  Out of his goodness we were made, but for what purpose though?  Simply to share in his own blessed life.  “For this reason, at every time and in every place, God draws close to man*.”  Take a second to soak that in.  Did you know right now that God is seeking you? 

Maybe you feel far away from God at the moment.  I remember a time in my life when I dreaded prayer.  I would do it like exercise.  The goal was to get through it as fast as I could by reciting a bunch of words.  It is true that whenever we try to pray it’s a good thing.  But was I allowing myself to be found by the God who loves me when I prayed like that?  No, in fact I was hiding because I did not know that God even cared that much to seek me.  I thought God only came to you if you did something bad.  Kind of like a school principal.   

God is not lonely.  Or mean.  God is love and he is seeking you this moment.  Wherever your heart is today, let Father, Son, and Holy Spirit find you.

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*Man is used to refer to all mankind here.
Graphic borrowed from: http://www.wired.com/tag/clouds/