Is There Proof God Exists? Yes 

The problem with most philosophical works aimed at proving God exists is that, at most, they prove a creative force or intelligence. However, they failed to bridge that entity with the god of any particular religion, particularly Christianity, Judaism or Islam. Whether it is the apologetic works of St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Anslem, or more modern Christian philosophers like Dr. William Lane Craig and Dr. Alvin Plantinga, they can't seem to fill the chasm between the intelligent vague being they are attempting to prove and the *SPECIFIC* God they want us to believe in. When I was an atheist, I found these arguments to be wholly insufficient. I became a believer, not because of their sophisticated polemic. I became a believer because of how empty my life was without belief.

Why must there be a first cause? Just because things we know have them doesn't mean everything must have one.

The sad thing is. No matter what we say, prove, show. Most people won't listen and they will keep their beliefs and say that its just a coincidence

Why is it prayer seems to be a one-way street? I've prayed, sought His 'help', asked for that 'joy unspeakable and peace that etc' yet I NEVER get ANY RESPONSE, SILENCE!!! I have sought his 'face' for 50 + years and = NOTHING! WHY? if he desires a relationship why is it a 1 way street? Where is my Abba?

These "arguments" shouldn't convince anybody.

If it is not observable it is indistinguishable from something that does not exist.

The cosmological argument has a small but non-negligeable weakness, the fact that everything that is was caused by something that is itself acausal does not necessarily means that it is god.

Universe wasnt created because there is no previous instance to be possible without time. So we can exclude God based on this crucial fact. No matter the argument, the time is the answer. Without time nothing is created. We live inside time. You can measure what happens within a time, but time itself cant be measured because we are inside it.

A great saying I heard is “ God is not a mind issue, it’s a heart issue”

My dear friend, in my quest to be a "good atheist" as per your definition I respectfully have to point out that the arguments of Anselm of Canterbury and Thomas Aquinas are merely logically unsound wordplay that no one should ever use and that your propagation of these bad arguments as if they had not been shown to be fallacious does not reflect well on your position at all.

If god existed there would be no need to prove his existence

What is the cause of the God? 1. God made of what materials 2. Why God created the universe 3. What are duties and responsibilities of the God 4. What is the relationship between God and us 5. Why God created human And many more questions I have.

You don't understand what the word "proof" means, my dude.

1) Demonstrate that your intuitions of causality extend beyond space and before time, and that there is a "beyond and before spacetime" in which for things to exist. 2) For the ontological argument to even start to make any sense, there has to be an absolutely objective definition of "greatness", down to exacting detail. Otherwise the greatest thing to me is different than your greatest thing and now we have billions of necessarily existing gods roaming the heretofore undemonstrated "beyond and before spacetime" 3) Saying "many people agree that X is true" is not equal to saying "X is true" . Morality is subjective in the same way favorite foods are, just to a different degree. If you polled many cultures and found that children ages 5 to 10 most preferred frozen treats as dessert, would that make frozen treats the objectively correct dessert choice? No, it just means humans are similar, and so act similarly. In the same way, wanting to increase wellbeing is just popular because we and our societies are similar. It doesn't mean it's the absolute and objectively correct choice for what we ought to care about. (That said, once a goal is chosen, moral facts can be found. If I want to maximize wellbeing, I ought not unalive people for fun, for example. I think it's this part that makes people think morality is objective. It's not, it only is once you agree on goals. I could go on with other objections to this, but I'm trying (and failing) to be brief) 4) First, before this argument can even get off the ground, demonstrate that the universal constants are able to change. Bonus points if you can quantify their ranges, gradations, relationships, and probability distributions. But so far, we don't even know that they could be different than what they are. You don't just get that for free. Bonus quibbles cuz I can't shut up: 7:10 You don't see objects acting in patterns *towards ends*, you see objects acting in patterns *and assume there's an end they're acting towards*. In reality, they're being pushed forward by prior events, not pulled towards future ones desired by some designer. Your car didn't start because you wanted to get to work, it started because you turned the key. In the conclusion, you saying you need faith to accept these arguments is tantamount to saying the arguments are worthless. Your side is gonna believe what they believe because they think they have a relationship with a god, not because of these hobbled arguments. And my side isn't gonna be convinced by these hobbled arguments to believe in a god. So what's their point? What value do they add to anything?

Point One) OK Something came first. Prove it was a god, then prove it is your god and then prove you have understood your god correctly. Point Two) By your own admission this is NOT a proof of god's existence, but one of how a god must be IF a god exists at all. This "proof", therefore, is not a proof of a god's existance. Point Three) Even if morality is something given to us by an external force, you have failed to prove that force is a god.However, you are wrong to say we are not taught morals. Of course, we are taught them. Have you not heard of bad parenting? It happens when parents don't teach the moral code to their kids. In truth, we have the same morals as others, because we benefit from them morals in the same way as others do. As tribes, nations and communities, we have all come to the same conclusions about what is best for us morally. It's a theory, anyway. For you to say our morals have ONLY come from god you would have to do two things: Prove a god exists (still waiting for that) and that my theory cannot be true. Point Four) The puddle argument! I need say nothing more. A whole life of belief gone with one YT comment!

Sorry, but there are no proofs. Those are just justifications based on ones preconceived concepts. All religion is based on faith alone, if there is proof, there is no need for faith.

My dad was a mathematician. He used to say that you can't study mathematics without coming to an understanding that God exists. The basis of the universe is ordered from the start and at its heart is orderly. He used to say that numbers are the basis of everything and order is at the base of everything.

"It's not that i don't understand you, it's that i don't believe you" - Rose Laylonde, Homestuck.

There is no need for a first cause, since the spacetime continuum is not an effect and cannot be caused since that would be a temporal affair which cannot happen since there was no time before spacetime. And Einstein made it pretty clear that motion in itself needs no cause since that is the whole point of the theory of relativity. Thus the cosmological argument is a non-starter. If you want to have something that existed throughout, then you can take the universe directly, since it existed at any point in time, since it is like I already said spacetime. The ontological argument falls also flat, since being able to imagine something better does not mean that this something better actually exists. And if I take it the other way around, that if your deity has the three omni properties that make it so perfect, how come then that the universe is then not also perfect reflecting that divine nature? Thus it is clear that if the universe has an origin in some entity, that entity is clearly no better than what it could make. For the moral argument there is the Euthyphro dilemma, and worse there is no reason to think that moral realism or divine command theory are even a proper description of morality. Since moral relativism and moral anti-realism are equally valid positions to hold. The theological argument is nonsense, since design is exactly the opposite from what we see. Design is elegance in simplicity not needless complexity. Furthermore that there is some order doesn't mean someone has to made these natural laws, for all we know there simply are no other options and thus all the proposed possibilities are just an illusion. The theological argument would be better if it would be impossible to exist and yet there would be life, and not just on our tiny planet, but everywhere and not relying on chemestry or energy but to be truly independent from any circumstances. Then you would have an argument that this would require some divine input. But as the world presents itself, the theological argument can be handwaved away as just a god of the gaps argument. All those arguments are debunked centuries if not millennia ago. And the "gift of faith" as you call it seems to be what actual rational people would call a conformation bias. Don't get me wrong, you can believe whatever you like, but it would have been if you would have also addressed the criticism those arguments have and why they are not considered proof, since a proof has actually be conclusive and cannot be founded just on faith. Also, I find it funny how the video basically dismisses all the followers of religions which also do not adhere to these silly arguments. Guess this is just another case of the typical Christian arrogance that look down on others as not having proper faith. And then they are surprised that so many people rejecting their message...

The friars four arguments have been debunked long ago, do the research.

A lot of special pleading, question begging, circular reasoning, non sequiturs and unsubstantiated claims.

"Is There Proof God Exists? Yes" - Why do you need to lie in your title? Yes, in the absence of evidence, people turn to logic... however, logical arguments cannot prove anything in reality. Every one of the arguments he presents have been debunked many, many times over.

There is nothing about the first cause theory that points to the cause being sentient, let alone omnipotent and omniscient, let alone good & loving

I've seen a watchmaker in action. Your god has never provably made a watch or a blade of grass. I can prove my claim with evidence? You, got a feeling.

The issue very surface level discussions of these arguments run into is that there have been counter points and further work done on all of these arguments which means presenting them in their most basic forms doesn't really cut the mustard. The cosmological argument requires you to swallow an entire Aristotelian metaphysics of causes, which you don't have to just accept and other theories of causation exist. Additionally, you could posit a non-intelligent "purely actual" force and get the same result. Kant neatly dealt with the Ontological argument by pointing out that "'being' is evidently not a real predicate" The Moral Argument presupposes there cannot be a natural explanation for social animals to develop certain behavioural patterns...which is question begging (or 'assuming the antecedent', for those more academically inclined), and incidentally the teleological argument makes the same mistake. Frankly, these are just not very strong arguments; which you'd come to expect given that these are being presented in essentially the same forms they were created in, with the oldest being around 1300 years old.

by logical arguments you mean broken arguments full of logical fallacies and scientific misunderstandings.

If there was such an obvious & evident god don't you think there would be obvious & evident evidence?

Oh nice another "everything is so complex and beautiful and we have empathy theres your proof that god must exist" video

There are also miracles, events that don't make sense when observed scientifically but make sense when you look at them with faith. I am extremely impressed by what happened at Fatima in Portugal and this is a thing that strengthened my faith.

Thank you for producing this video. Unfortunately these arguments have been put to bed over and over and should not be convincing. It's still cool to hear how believed see things even if I don't find the claims convincing

I like the ontological argument best. A god that has convinced me that he exists is greater than a god that has not done so, therefore the god that has convinced me he exists must exist, but no such god has done so, therefore this argument fails.

Father Casey is it a sin to trie to give God a image like a painting of Our heavenly father ?

Same old tired, worn out and debunked arguments... and not one iota of proof.

I just got out of a philosophy of religion class where we were debating the existence of God, feeling frustrated - and this was the first thing I saw. Deo gratias!

How are we to pray the lent fast

The most concise treatment of this subject I’ve seen so far. The good friar’s final thoughts in this video provide context for the diversity of reactions in this string of comments.

Father Casey, your videos consistently bring me joy and help me in my spiritual journey. Even though I'm not Catholic, I'm now seriously exploring the priesthood in my own tradition (Orthodox Christian) thanks to your videos.

So, in summary: these aren't convincing, or logically coherent arguments. They are just crutches to reinforce your confirmation bias.

Around the literally billions of people used to think the world was flat too. So what?

I dont think these arguments work. Their premises aren't all correct.

None of these arguments stands up to even a cursory analysis. You have to start by believing in god to consider these “proofs”. ( i.e. they’re really post-hoc rationalizations, not proofs).

Can you do a video about how it is to join the catholic community as an adult? Genuinely curious about the whole process. I come from a very Catholic town but didn't grow up in the church myself. I do believe in God but am not sure how to join the congregation or how it would work as an adult coming in for the first time.

This is right up there with “Look at the trees!“

'We don't know, therefore God.' has a name: The God of the Gaps. I'm sorry, but there are FAR too many other possibilities. Remember, energy can neither be created nor destroyed. It is just as plausible that energy has simply always existed, regardless of its form.

Practice makes perfect. The enthusiasm to create & bravery to present are commendable. The delivery & information itself was sporatic & inconclusive. Keep working on it ✌️🤝👏

Have you ever asked yourself why George Lemaître warned the pope not to use the big bang model as a prove of creation? Also how do I get from this strange beeing "proven" by Casey to the God of the good old bible or the catholic church. There is a gap...

The third one. Teleological argument is my thought. That if you look at everything. As small and complex as an atom to heck where the planets are perfectly place with ours being perfectly placed to sustain life itself is proof.

As a scientist and not necessarily a believer, I find these arguments very unhelpful. These arguments are not universally accepted by science, so you can't really call them proofs. Presenting them as proof is at best a mistake and at worst deeply misleading.

Where is the evidence? It ain't in this video.

The most authentic arguments for the existence of a god are found in Islamic Philosophy. But Unfortunately NONE of them prove the existence of a God.

Using terrible, debunked arguments doesn't proved god. It just shows theists like you still have nothing.

The greatest gift my mother gave me was making sure I was baptized. I feel sorry for people who have no faith, what an empty life to live.

When I get into my car to drive to the mall I always fasten my seatbelt. Why? Because blunt force injury resulting from a sudden stoppage could kill me. Blood loss could kill me as well. I'm mortal, I'm incapable of shapeshifting and I'm incapable of flight. Contrast this with my natural enemy, the vampire. The vampire can do all the things I can not and the only way you can kill it is my driving a wooden stake through its heart. Why did God make vampires so powerful and humans so weak?

Did anyone catch the argument against an infinite regress used in the cosmological argument here?

With all due respect, this is a waste of breath, word salad, click bait. Of course there is no proof of god, and it doesn’t matter- That is the reason why religion is called faith.

Why would an all knowing, all powerful and all good God have any need or desire to create? What would be the point?

God allowed us to be conscious beings with souls to realise God exists this is what makes us unique of all the life forms on the planet .

Wait . . . what comes after Z?

This is one of the worst, weakest collections of arguments for a god I’ve ever seen. Genuinely.

This is so funny to watch bro is speed running logical fallacies 😂😂😂

Using philosophical arguments to prove that something exists in reality is just silly. "Does X exist in reality?" is not a philosophical question. To answer that question, you need evidence. Philosophical arguments are not evidence.

I wish I could use reason to evangelize but it is just frustrating that most people are not willing to hear what we have to say

I heard the explanation of God being outside of space, time and matter explained this way. The inventor of plastic could not have been made of plastic so the inventor of matter cannot be made of matter. The inventor of plastic had to exist before plastic in order to invent it so to did the inventor of matter need to exist before all matter came into being,

I was under the assumption that St. Thomas Aquinas argument didn't refer to cronological but jerarquical causation. Because the universe could be infinite, which negates the necessity for a first cause uncaused as the series can be continued ad aeternum. So St. Thomas considered this and wrote not refering to a cronological cause in the sense of "my parents caused my existence" but to a jerarquical cause in the sense of "the glass is held by the table", or, in other words, some Being must hold all other beings into being without needing to be held. I'm no theologian so take this with a grain of salt though

Thank you, Fr. Casey Cole

I’ve been blessed with proof. Praying for all those who need it too.

I recently disagreed with you, but I still love your channel, it's so nice to see a young man who has devoted his life to God, especially in these crazy times, especially one who is so well spoken

Just because there has to be a cause for the universe’s existence doesn’t mean it has to be a being, it could just be a ‘thing’.

For the purposes of this argument, I will accept the premise that there must be **A** being that created the universe. Prove that it was your particular being. Please avoid any circular reasoning such as "the bible says it's true, which we accept as true because the bible says so"

Proof would be a compromise to faith. If everyone knew god was real, it would be just a matter of doing right and wrong as if you were following a law.

Two can play this game. Proof his god doesn't exist: 1. A perfect being could not produce anything that's not perfect 2. The world is far far far from perfect 3. Therefore a perfect being couldn't exist Oh no, the guy who dresses up in the favorite outfit of child diddlers. Please choose a more respectable costume of you wish to be taken seriously.

Do you ever doubt God and feel like he is forsaken you? As a veterans, being in combat I question God and why things happened the way it is.

The cosmological argument is the only one that I find actually challenging. However, I believe that the argument only stablishes that their must be a first uncaused cause... not that the uncaused cause has to be god. Besides, you could argue, why doesn't god have a cause? I can't think of a reason why we couldn't stop the regression a little before getting to god (maybe the universe itself is the uncaused cause) or after god (something else that caused god to exist)

For me, the biggest surprise newly coming to faith was the realisation that I did not need to prove to myself that God exists. It was the concept of there being no god was what made no sense.

The fact that the Universe existes,proves God's existence,too. If we deny the existence of God,we deny the existence of everything.

"4:00 - If god is that which nothing greater can be thought, then god must be omnipresent, all loving, and sufficient." Say what now? I'm going to go with, no. Another thing, maybe stop mentioning " logic" in ANY argument for god, as there is NONE.

A flaw in deducing the existence of god from philosophical consideration is that those considerations can only produce hypotheses. The way to verify the certainty of a hypothesis with respect to reality is to confront it with data from that reality. Hypotheses will always be assumptions.

These only point at some kind of origin, some event or expression of energy. It can't prove the god of any religion or philosophy. However...there is one: Personal, transcendent experience. I had one such event. It went against everything I had up until that time. It went beyond my beliefs, expectations, doubts and all of the notions I'd heard or read. "Something" touched me, made me whole, removed my deepest doubts. And the amazing thing, the proof, is that I didn't ask for it. There's no chance I'd psyched myself out. With NO EXPECTATION, it moved through me. It claimed no religion or belief or doctrine. It touched me with healing love and reassurance. Out of the blue. Now maybe there's some fundamentalist out there who thinks I was touched by the devil. Well, here's my reaction: You weren't there. I was.

The very last part of this post was its best! When I was in the seminary, at the end of my priest-professor ‘s statement, “ There you have the five proof for God’s existence”, I asked him what if I met someone who just denied the actual existence of God. After all, that would have been a normal question brought up by someone who didn’t believe. His response was “you ask too many questions”. Your tieing up the way the strings of the REASONABLENESS of belief would have been a far better response! To wonder and ask questions of things is important. Otherwise your act of faith would be only an act of scientific thought.

Sir Isaac Newton had a friend who, like himself, was a great scientist; but he was an infidel, while Newton was a devout Christian. They often discussed their views concerning God, as their mutual interest in science drew them much together. Newton had a skillful mechanic make him a replica of our solar system in miniature. In the center was a large gilded ball representing the sun, and revolving in proper order around this were small balls fixed on the ends of arms of varying lengths, representing Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. These bails were so geared together by cogs and belts as to move in perfect harmony when turned by a crank. One day, as Newton sat reading in his study with his mechanism on a large table near him, his infidel friend stepped in. Scientist that he was, he recognized at a glance what was before him. Stepping up to it, he slowly turned the crank, and with undisguised admiration watched the heavenly bodies all move with their relative speeds in their orbits. Standing off a few feet he exclaimed, "My! What an exquisite thing this is! Who made it?" Without looking up from his book, Newton answered, "Nobody!" Quickly turning to Newton, the infidel said, "Evidently you did not understand my question. I asked who made this?" Looking up now, Newton solemnly assured him that nobody made it, but that the aggregation of matter so much admired had just happened to assume the form it was in. But the astonished infidel replied with some heat, "You must think I am a fool! Of course somebody made it, and he is a genius, and I'd like to know who he is." Laying his book aside, Newton arose and laid a hand on his friend's shoulder. "This thing is but a puny imitation of a much larger system whose laws you know, and I am not able to convince you that this mere toy is without a design and maker; yet you profess to believe that the great original from which the design is taken has come into being without either designer or maker! Now tell me by what sort of reasoning do you reach such an incongruous conclusion?"

When you stop using models that were shown wrong even before Newton, then you might start getting somewhere. Until then, it's total gibberish.

Question: Why can't there be an infinite regression?? What specifically excludes this possibility? Because it's a very large number? Not a good enough reason, because it still doesn't prove it's impossible. Question: Why is god so special he is the first uncaused cause? Or uncreated creation?? Why is this entity excluded from your entire cosmological argument that something must cause something?

God is exactly a Santa Claus character.

Me and my cat are atheists. My dog is a confused theist cuz he thinks I'm a god. No reasoning with him, so me and my cat just pity him 😞

The usual = Can't explain how it is... so there MUST be a god. Also, how convenient that said god is the one you were born into. Nothing more than the God of the Gaps and the Argument from Ignorance. So much for "Proof god exists".

Hi I wanted to ask you something about what you said in a video about homosexuality you said "Taking a stance against homosexual 00:07:25.480 actions may be our biblical responsibility, but judging, condemning, or casting out people 00:07:31.400 simply for how they are created… couldn’t be further from the true teaching of the Bible." did you mean that homosexuals were created like that by God ?

Not knowing what happened before the beginning of your or our understanding isn't proof of God. This is insane.

Once again the ONLY proof you have is I am telling you ! Strange as it may seem its as dishonest, ignorant and delusional as before

There is also mathematical proof of God, by Kurt Goedel. However, such thoughts don't convince many people. I like Schleiermacher: "Religion is our feeling for the eternal"

@breaking the habit I have a doubt. Doesn't having proof goes against having faith? How can there be faith if there is proof?

I think that we should start standing for aur Christian beliefs. Or else it will be too late

I wouldn't go so far as to call myself an atheists , but I am a non-believer. I love your videos and I wish to interact this one in a sincere good faith of sharing perspective so I am saying up front that the things I am about to say are not meant in any way to disprove God, or to devalue the faith of the faithful. You mention in the beginning of the video that atheists are confused as to how people can believe in god so I am just wanting to answer and expand on that. Firstly, a lot of atheists aren't confused at all as to the why or how people believe in God. I am certainly not and I can come up with fine reasons to justify such a belief. It makes me sad that so many atheists are just, ironically, 'holier than thou' about it. I don't think the belief is delusional and neither do my close friends who share my views. But acknowledging something is reasonably believable is not the same as adopting that belief yourself. Secondly, the first proof you offer about the origin of the universe is basically a god of the gaps argument. It's saying that God must be the answer because no other answer is readily available. But being the only conceivable answer to many does not mean it is the only possible one. Many like myself just believe that we can not and will not ever know the truth of the big bang or the origin of everything. Many people think it's impossible that the universe has simply existed forever, going through this cycle again and again on lengths of time well beyond our ability to comprehend. God does not even actually provide an answer to the question of where everything started, he just adds an extra step. Where did God start? Why do you not require an answer to that? Thirdly, morality is arguably an evolutionary trait. We have morals because a species that does not harm and destroy itself has one less enemy in the world. In the early days of human existence, stealing wasn't just deemed wrong because it hurt somebody, it was deemed wrong because it could mean death. It could mean food wasn't there when it was needed. It could mean a weapon wasn't where it was supposed to be if an attack came. Our modern day morals are built on those ancient pillars. A lot of theft today doesn't amount to much in threatening the survivability of the tribe of course, but it's still considered wrong because if it wasn't, we'd turn on each other. Fourthly, the teleological argument is.. well, it's god of the gaps again. It's saying that God must be the cause simply because no other answer is readily available, but even you say that it's highly improbably. Not impossible, but improbable. Improbably things happen all the time. Somebody has to win the lottery eventually after all. The chance that the world exists as it does today is inconceivably small, but here it is. "I have a hard time believing it" does not mean "It is impossible". You say there is no way that this is the result of randomness, but I have no idea why it can't be. You're arguing on the premise that the concept of beauty existed before beautiful things in our world did but why can it not be that the world exists as it is by chance, and we have just come to consider our favorite parts of it beautiful? The evolutionary sciences show well enough that order absolutely can come from chaos. The watchmaker argument falls apart entirely because the world is not a watch. There are evolutionary dead ends everywhere, vestigial body parts, useless things, the junk accumulated in a world that comes about through chance is easy to find. The watch maker does not put random gears in the watch that cause it to stop working before it should. They don't sprinkle dust into it or warp parts of it, but things like genetic anomalies pop up all the time. I really appreciate the ending message of your video, thank you for not painting people who are not convinced as simply being willfully ignorant or wanting *not* to believe. And again I wish to state that the things I have said here are not arguments against God or faith. Just my considered answers to your offered proofs, as a nonbeliever. For what it's worth, I would like to believe. I have tried to believe, but it just does not stick. I hear the way people describe the way their faith makes them feel. I've heard of moments of intense clarity and bam, the faith manifests in their hearts. But I have just never felt anything like that. When I try to engage with faith sincerely, I just feel nothing there. I'm getting older, and I'm terrified of death. I so dearly want to believe there is something waiting past my last breath. But trying to 'just believe in it' only ever feels like trying to build a house of cards, it collapses at the slightest nudge of self scrutiny. Still. Your videos bring me joy. I find them interesting, educational, and at times uplifting. What I wouldn't give to live in a world full of people so sincerely loving, sympathetic, and forgiving. Even when I don't agree with you, I enjoy listening to what you have to say, so thank you, and please keep it up.

When discussing creation I find it amusing that some individuals have no problem accepting spontaneous creation from nothing without cause while calling intelligent design fantasy. 🕊️

Chris Langan has done a lot of interesting work on this topic as well.

To me the first argument makes the most logical sense. The other arguments are easier to believe if you already agree that there is a god. We are working with a set of 1. While it is valid to observe the seemingly ordered nature of reality and attribute it to god, it would also be valid to point out that we don’t know what potential other species of intelligent life would find moral, maybe our morality is underpinned my the nature of scarcity. Also we don’t know what all the other permutations of the universe would be like if we altered its structure and laws. If the speed of light was slightly faster or gravitational force more present in respect to the other forces, we cannot imagine the results. That’s why I think infinite regression is the hardest devil to advocate for. You can theorize all day but you still have the question why hanging over it all. Why something rather than nothing. The answer is that the start was set in motion by something not confined by our nature of reality. God.

God of the gaps ...

In my opinion, there is no entirely convincing way of proving God's existence, especially if we apply scientific standards. However, to me this is precisely what makes religion so beautiful and appealing. What is the point of "believing" in God if we have scientific proof of his existence? I regard the story of the doubting Thomas as a powerful example for all of us: We should believe even if we do not see. Doubting is deeply entrenched in human nature, so I think that doubting God's existence and power to then find your way back to God is an essential part of being a Christian - this is what constitutes firm belief.

I find the cosmological argument to be flawed because we can only trace the universe’s “beginning” back to a very early point. We don’t know if it was created from literally nothing or if it was even created at all. Since you’re ascribing eternal universe creating properties to a hypothetical being, you could just as easily argue that the universe is cyclical and goes through phases of expansion and contraction. The universe could also exist as part of a larger multiverse which operates by completely different rules. I don’t know if I believe any of those, but my point is we just don’t know, and assigning a god to its creation when it’s not the only option seems presumptuous.

At 1:04, I heard "theological" but saw "teleological."

excellent video, Father.