An Absence of the Eternal?

Therefore, we must maintain great stillness of mind, even in the midst of our struggles. We shall then be able to distinguish between the different types of thoughts that come to us: those that are good, those sent by God, we will treasure in our memory; those that are evil and inspired by the devil we will reject….

Does a lack of knowledge, concerning that which is Eternal, cause one to focus on the temporal? And, shouldn’t the fact that God is Immutable and Omnipotent, wholly outside of all time and space, shape one’s behavior in this life?

To examine these questions in all truth, one must consider the teaching of the Catholic Church, as it has been articulated at the Fourth Lateran Council (1215):

We firmly believe and simply confess that there is only one true God, eternal and immeasurable, almighty, unchangeable, incomprehensible and ineffable, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, three persons but one absolutely simple essence, substance or nature. The Father is from none, the Son from the Father alone, and the Holy Spirit from both equally, eternally without beginning or end; the Father generating, the Son being born, and the Holy Spirit proceeding; consubstantial and coequal, co-omnipotent and coeternal; one principle of all things, creator of all things invisible and visible, spiritual and corporeal; who by his almighty power at the beginning of time created from nothing both spiritual and corporeal creatures, that is to say angelic and earthly, and then created human beings composed as it were of both spirit and body in common. The devil and other demons were created by God naturally good, but they became evil by their own doing. Man, however, sinned at the prompting of the devil.[1]

The first thing to notice concerning this constitution, is that the tone is distinct, completely clear in its definition. Especially regarding the fact, that the three persons of the Trinity are One Absolutely Simple Essence, Eternal, Incomprehensible and Ineffable. And, that God is from none:

The revelation of the ineffable name “I Am who Am” contains then the truth that God alone IS. The Greek Septuagint translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, and following it the Church’s Tradition, understood the divine name in this sense: God is the fullness of Being and of every perfection, without origin and without end. All creatures receive all that they are and have from him; but he alone is his very being, and he is of himself everything that he is.[2]

God exists from all eternity, He is the fullness of Being, possessing every perfection without origin and without end – before anything was created or brought into being by Him.

And, God creates out of love:

Benevolence is the first sign of love because love naturally desires that one’s beloved have the best of gifts. Have you ever wondered why a perfectly sufficient being would freely choose to bring out of nothing an entire world well below himself? God’s acting solely on our behalf is an unparalleled act of generosity: here there is absolutely no trace of debt or a gift given in hope of a better one being given in return. The Godhead chooses to create solely out of love, knowing that the height of this gift—the human person—would enjoy being alive in a universe teeming with creatures of all sorts, with hundreds of billions of galaxies, brimming with colors and hues and textures, with angels whose celestial existence bring unhidden joys, and a human race whom he formed—and will save—out of nothing other than love.[3]

Thus, if one were to ponder the example of an artist, one who has a true love for his craft, does not his involvement in the creation of a new work of art – convey his inner state? If so, how is it possible that God create anything that does not in some way speak of Himself?

The heavens declare the glory of God; the firmament proclaims the works of his hands. Day unto day pours forth speech; night unto night whispers knowledge. There is no speech, no words; their voice is not heard; A report goes forth through all the earth, their messages, to the ends of the world. He has pitched in them a tent for the sun; it comes forth like a bridegroom from his canopy, and like a hero joyfully runs its course. From one end of the heavens it comes forth; its course runs through to the other; nothing escapes its heat.[4]

Man as the crown of God’s creation, made in His image and likeness and endowed with the faculty of reason, has been afforded the opportunity to choose Him and acknowledge the love he has been shown:

The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God and for God; and God never ceases to draw man to himself. Only in God will he find the truth and happiness he never stops searching for:

The dignity of man rests above all on the fact that he is called to communion with God. This invitation to converse with God is addressed to man as soon as he comes into being. For if man exists, it is because God has created him through love, and through love continues to hold him in existence. He cannot live fully according to truth unless he freely acknowledges that love and entrusts himself to his creator (cf. Vatican Council II, GS 19 § 1).[5]

Herein lies the problem, all who would refuse to acknowledge God, reject Him, or worse yet, sin against Him – lose the very anchor by which one is able to discern with clarity between truth and error:

The light of true knowledge makes it possible to discern without error the difference between good and evil. Then the path of justice, which leads to the Sun of Justice, brings the mind into the limitless light of knowledge, since it never fails to seek the love of God with all confidence.

Therefore, we must maintain great stillness of mind, even in the midst of our struggles. We shall then be able to distinguish between the different types of thoughts that come to us: those that are good, those sent by God, we will treasure in our memory; those that are evil and inspired by the devil we will reject….

The mind is capable of tasting and distinguishing accurately whatever is presented to it. Just as when our health is good we can tell the difference between good and bad food by our bodily sense of taste and reach for what is wholesome, so when our mind is strong and free from all anxiety, it is able to taste the riches of divine consolation, and to preserve, through love, the memory of this taste. This teaches us what is best with absolute certainty. As Saint Paul says: My prayer is that your love may increase more and more in knowledge and insight, and so enable you to choose what is best.[6]

In refusing to acknowledge God, by outright rejecting Him, or sinning against Him with abandon – one is effectively lying to oneself:

The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to such a pass that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect he ceases to love, and in order to occupy and distract himself without love he gives way to passions and coarse pleasures, and sinks to bestiality in his vices, all from continual lying to other men and to himself. The man who lies to himself can be more easily offended than anyone. You know it is sometimes very pleasant to take offence, isn’t it? A man may know that nobody has insulted him, but that he has invented the insult for himself, has lied and exaggerated to make it picturesque, has caught at a word and made a mountain out of a molehill—he knows that himself, yet he will be the first to take offence, and will revel in his resentment till he feels great pleasure in it, and so pass to genuine vindictiveness. But get up, sit down, I beg vou. All this, too, is deceitful posturing.[7]

Thus, it is they who receive the grace of God, they who acknowledge and depend upon Him for His assistance, who are able to see with clarity, and those who do not – encounter spiritual blindness: “Against those among them ‘who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others,’ Jesus affirmed: ‘I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance’ (cf. Lk 18:9; 5:32; cf. Jn 7:49; 9:34). He went further by proclaiming before the Pharisees that, since sin is universal, those who pretend not to need salvation are blind to themselves” (cf. Jn 8:33-36; 9:40-41).[8]

And, being spiritually blinded – they focus solely upon the temporal:

It is not often nowadays that men speak of eternity; their thoughts are almost always on time. In fact, Time has become one of the most important things in the world. Some years ago, before physics became the fashionable science, the human mind was wont to conceive of time as something in which things happened. Now it is looked upon as the very fabric of the universe. Sacred Scripture tells us that a moment will come when there will be no more time. The unsacred scripture of our day tells us that Time is the very essence of things.

Would we seek for evidences of this mood of temporalism, we could find them in every nook and corner of the world today. In the field of morals, for example, the current doctrine is that any action is moral, provided the time in which we live regards it as moral. Religion, too, has drunk deep of the intoxicating draughts of temporalism, and now reeling under its effects, it preaches a religion wholly confined to Time, utterly oblivious of Eternity. It no longer asks a man to save his soul for Eternity; it asks him to save his body for Time. It is unconcerned about citizenship in the Kingdom of God, but tremendously excited about citizenship in the Kingdom of Time. That is, incidentally, why some modern religions stress birth-control, favoring as they do the economic motive that belongs to Time, rather than the religious motive which belongs to eternity. Philosophy, too, has become so obsessed with that notion that it teaches with unbuttoned pride that there is no such thing as Truth with a capital “T,” for Truth is ambulatory: we make it as we go; it depends on the Time in which we live. There are not even wanting writers who have gone to the excess of saying that God is not in Eternity, but is in Time, or rather He is being produced by whole cosmic floods of Time, undergoing miraculous baptisms at the hands of Time, and being hurled onwards and forwards to some goal which is not yet certain, but which Time will reveal if we ever give it Time enough.

The Church is not in sympathy with this mood of temporalism. It teaches that it is about time that we cease talking about Time, and begin to think of the Timeless.[9]

[1] Papal Encyclicals Online. Fourth Lateran Council 1215. Constitutions. P1. accessed February 10, 2026.  https://www.papalencyclicals.net/councils/ecum12-2.htm

[2] Catholic Church. Catechism of the Catholic Church : Revised in Accordance with the Official Latin Text Promulgated by Pope John Paul II. 2nd ed. Vatican City

Washington, DC: Libreria Editrice Vaticana ;

United States Catholic Conference, 1997., 213., (Hereafter cited as CCC).

[3] Catholic Answers. The Soul of Apologetics. God Creates Out of Love. P3. accessed February 10, 2026.  https://shop.catholic.com/blog/god-creates-out-of-love/?srsltid=AfmBOop3fjCz1w4M4BNiQ_YIBYbf3HYffxZpQmf3ghcrPqpir6sVhzKW

[4] Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Catholic Church, Saint Joseph Edition of the New American Bible (Washington, D.C. United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, and Totowa, NJ: Catholic Book Publishing Co. 2011)., Psa. 19:2-7.

[5] CCC, 27.

[6] Diadochus of Photice, Catholic Church and Franciscans. 1975 1976. The Divine Office : The Liturgy of the Hours According to the Roman Rite : As Renewed by Decree of the Second Vatican Council and Promulgated by the Authority of Pope Paul. Volume III. New York: Catholic Book Pub., On Spiritual Perfection., pg. 154., 155.

[7] Dostoyevsky, Fyodor. 1922. The Brothers Karamazov : In Two Volumes / Vol. 1. London, New York: Dent ; Dutton., pg. 39.

[8] CCC, 588.

[9] Sheen, Fulton J. 1932. Moods and Truths,. New York: The Century Co., pg. 225-227.