Lesson from Fr. Paulus | Creation Tells Us About God

The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is one the most difficult to explain. Pope Benedict's uses the analogy of electricity to explain the existence of God.

No one actually sees electricity, he explains, but we do see its effects, and so we know it exists - the light bulb goes on, the vacuum cleaner goes on, the alarm clock goes off. Just so, no one actually sees God directly, face to face, but we do see the works of God - the Church, the saints, and, of course, the beautiful, amazing world around us.

The Psalm 8 says: "When I see your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and stars that you set in place... What is man that you are mindful of him?" This expresses the sense of wonder that we have all experienced at one time or another in the face of the beauty of creation. Sometimes we are so awed by the magnificence of a sunset, or a moonrise, or an ocean view, that it almost overwhelms us.

The Book of Proverbs chapter 8 expresses the Wisdom of God is personified, and describes himself as pre-existing all the mysterious wonders of the visible world: the mountains and hills, the oceans and skies, the very foundations of the earth...

Before all these things came into existence, God's wisdom was already at work. The point the Proverb is making is that all those wonderful, beautiful things, as impressive as they are, are only a dim reflection of the wonder and beauty of God who made them.

Today as the Church turns our attention towards the inner nature of God himself, the blessed Trinity, she does so by turning our attention to the Trinity's glorious work of art: creation.

Pope Pius XII Praises Creation

As Catholics, we should be the biggest fans of nature's beauties.All of creation is for us!God has given it to us to teach us about himself, and for our sheer delight.All the recent popes have stressed this often overlooked or distorted aspect of our Catholic spirituality.

I would like to read one example, from a speech made by Pope Pius XII back in 1955. He was addressing a group of filmmakers, and as he discussed the power of movies as an art form, he gave special attention to documentaries that present the beauties of nature.

First, he summarized the Christian concept of nature as a mirror of God's wisdom: "Nature, which offers itself to the inspection of the attentive observer, reveals an inexhaustible wealth of goodness and beauty, reflecting back with transparent sincerity the infinite superabundance of the perfection and beauty of nature's Creator."

He went on to praise that beauty: "Sometimes one is enchanted and overcome by the majesty of towering mountains, at other times by the irresistible fury of the ocean tempest, the solitude of polar glaciers, the vast stretch of virgin forests, the melancholy of the desert sands, the loveliness of flowers, the limpid quality of water, the violent rush of waterfalls, the distinctive beauty of the Northern Lights... Greater astonishment and wealth of knowledge are offered by... the secrets of the animal kingdom... in forests and in inhospitable deserts, on rivers and in the depths of the sea. What a testimony to the richness and manifold variety of nature... to soothe, recreate and refresh the spirit."

Those are the words of a man who had discovered the real secret of nature - not the secret of how nature works, but the secret of what nature is for: to show us the smile and strength of our God.

We should thank God for the gift of creation, this first book of revelation that shows so much about God's power, beauty, and wisdom. But we should also make good use of it. The world of nature is meant to be the environment in which we live out our life's vocation, and that vocation involves the whole person, body and soul. That's why weaving contact with nature into the busy schedule of modern life is so important - it helps keep us balanced.

Lack of balance is one of the causes behind stress and depression, which, according to statistics, are among the most common negative effects of today's lifestyle. As human beings, we are meant to interact creatively with our environment - building houses and cities, making works of art, learning to use the earth's resources.

All those things are natural for us. But at the same time, we were not meant to isolate ourselves from our natural environment. We are not robots. We are not artificial. When we treat ourselves as if we were, stress and depression are the result.

We need to follow the rhythms of night and day, of the seasons. We need contact with earth, the sea, and the sky. That's how God made us. It helps us keep our balance - psychological, emotional, physical, and spiritual.

It doesn't have to be complicated and expensive. It can be as simple as family trips to the park, taking walks under the stars, as eating Sunday dinner together.

God's beautiful creation is a gift that he renews each day. Today, when we receive the Creator himself under the appearances of bread and wine, the "fruit of the earth and fruit of the vine," let's thank him for this gift, and let's promise to use it wisely.