Father, God the
Father, God the
The First Person of the Blessed Trinity. He is truly Father as He begets a co-eternal and co-equal Son, to whom He imparts the plenitude of His Nature and in Whom He contemplates His own perfect image. By nature God is Our Creator and Lord, and we are His creatures and subjects. By sin we are His enemies and deserve His chastisements. By grace, however, He lovingly pardons us, adopts us as sons, and destines us to share in the life and beatitude of His only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ. Thus by Divine adoption God is Our Father and we are His children. This adoption is effected through sanctifying grace, a Divine quality or supernatural habit infused into the soul by God, which blossoms into the vision of glory in life eternal.
Fuente: New Catholic Dictionary
Father, God the
In the Christian religion God is conceived of as Father, Our Father … in heaven (Mat 6:9, Mat 6:14, Mat 6:26, etc.), the God and Father of the Lord Jesus (2Co 11:31, etc.). The tenderness of relation and wealth of love and grace embraced in this profound designation are peculiar to Christ’s gospel. Pagan religions also could speak of God as Father (Zeus Pater), and in the general sense of Creator God has a universal fatherly relation to the world (Act 17:24-28). In the Old Testament God was revealed as Father to the chosen nation (Exo 4:22), and to the special representative of the nation, the king (2Sa 7:14), while fatherly love is declared to be the image of His pity for those who fear Him (Psa 103:13). In the gospel of Jesus alone is this Fatherhood revealed to be of the very essence of the Godhead, and to have respect to the individual. Here, however, there is need for great discrimination. To reach the heart of the truth of the Divine Fatherhood it is necessary to begin, not with man, but with the Godhead itself, in whose eternal depths is found the spring of that Fatherly love that reveals itself in time. It is first of all in relation to the eternal Son – before all time – that the meaning of Fatherhood in God is made clear (Joh 1:18). In God the Father we have a name pointing to that relation which the first Person in the adorable Trinity sustains to Son and Holy Spirit – also Divine (Mat 28:19). From this eternal fountain-head flow the relations of God as Father (1) to the world by creation; (2) to believers by grace. Man as created was designed by affinity of nature for sonship to God. The realization of this – his true creature-destiny – was frustrated by sin, and can now only be restored by redemption. Hence, the place of sonship in the gospel, as an unspeakable privilege (1Jo 3:1), obtained by grace, through regeneration (Joh 1:12, Joh 1:13), and adoption (Rom 8:14, Rom 8:19). In this relation of nearness and privilege to the Father in the kingdom of His Son (Col 1:13), believers are sons of God in a sense true of no others. It is a relation, not of nature, but of grace. Fatherhood is now the determinative fact in God’s relation to them (Eph 3:14). It is an error, nevertheless, to speak of fatherhood as if the whole character of God was therein sufficiently expressed. God is Father, but equally fundamental is His relation to His world as its Moral Ruler and Judge. From eternity to eternity the holy God must pronounce Himself against sin (Rom 1:18); and His fatherly grace cannot avert judgment where the heart remains hard and impenitent (Rom 2:1-9). For the fuller discussion of these points see GOD; CHILDREN OF GOD; TRINITY.