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8 • Part I. The Creed: The Faith Professed
reason, although there are many difficulties in coming to this knowl-
edge because of humanity’s historical and sinful condition.
• By our openness to goodness and truth, our experience, our sense
of moral goodness, our listening to the voice of conscience, and our
desire for happiness, we can discern our spiritual soul and can come
to see that this could only have its origin in God.
• We can speak of God even if our limited language cannot exhaust
the mystery of who he is.
• While we can come to know something about God by our natural
power of reason, there is a deeper knowledge of God that comes to
us through Divine Revelation.
MEDITATION
Where did I find you, that I came to know you? You were not
within my memory before I learned of you. Where, then, did I
find you before I came to know you, if not within yourself, far
above me? . . .
Late have I loved you, O Beauty ever ancient, ever new, late
have I loved you! . . . Created things kept me from you; yet if they
had not been in you they would not have been at all. [O eternal
truth, true love and beloved eternity. You are my God. To you I
sigh day and night.] . . . You were with me but I was not with you.
Created things kept me from you; yet if they had not been in you
they would not have been at all. You called, you shouted, and you
broke through my deafness. You flashed, you shone, and you dis-
pelled my blindness. You breathed your fragrance on me; I drew
in breath and now I pant for you. I have tasted you; now I hunger
and thirst for more. You touched me, and I burn for your peace.
—St. Augustine,
The Confessions
, bk. 10, chap. 26, 27.37