Thomas Aquinas on God's Presence to all things

CHAPTER LXVI—That nothing gives Being except in as much as it acts in the Power of God

NOTHING gives being except in so much as it is an actual being. But God preserves things in actuality.

5. The order of effects is according to the order of causes. But among all effects the first is being: all other things, as they proceed from their cause, are determinations of being. Therefore being is the proper effect of the prime agent, and all other things act inasmuch as they act in the power of the prime agent. Secondary agents, which are in a manner particular determinants of the action of the prime agent, have for the proper effects of their action other perfections determinant of being.[1]

6. What is essentially of a certain nature, is properly the cause of that which comes to have that nature only by participation.[1] But God alone is being by essence, all others are beings by participation. Therefore the being of everything that exists is an effect properly due to God; so that anything that brings anything else into being does so insomuch as it acts in the power of God.

Hence it is said: God created all things to be (Wisd. i, 14).

CHAPTER LXVII—That God is the Cause of Activity in all Active Agents

AS God not only gave being to things when they first began to be, but also causes being in them so long as they exist (Chap. LXV); so He did not once for all furnish them with active powers, but continually causes those powers in them, so that, if the divine influx were to cease, all activity would cease.

Hence it is said: Thou hast wrought all our works in us, O Lord (Isa. xxvi, 12). And for this reason frequently in the Scriptures the effects of nature are put down to the working of God, because He it is that works in every agent, physical or voluntary: e.g., Hast thou not drawn me out like milk, and curdled me like cheese? with skin and flesh thou hast clothed me, with bones and sinews thou hast put me together (Job x, 10, 11).

From -- OF God and His Creatures

It is late; and one should know better than to post anything about Aquinas when sleep is nigh, but here goes anyway.

Such a perspective as this, I think, can help greatly in overcoming many of the contemporary arguments over God's sovereignty. The extremes are as follows. For some, sovereignty must mean that God causes all things by a particular action or a particular will in every instance. For others, sovereignty is a notion that does away with human freedom, hence they are willing to redefine it -- almost away. For others sovereignty means God is never not able to cause or to stop an action. Hence, all that occurs happens because God allows it to occur. For others, God is open and therefore the world is undetermined.

But if Aquinas is anywhere near correct in his formulation of the relationship that creatures have to God, sovereignty can take on a new meaning, one which does acknowledges God's involvement in all things but does not deny human freedom. On this view, no act can take place without the "divine influx" (as Aquinas puts it) making that action (excuse the neologism) existible. Each and every thought, act of an agent, or event among non-agent entities (ex. growing flowers and speeding comets) is only possible as God shares his own activity of existing with them.

Hence, we can begin to meditate on the great mystery of iniquity (as St. Paul says) as well as the tragedy of sin. No sinful act by any human being can take place apart from God's enabling the very existence of the act by allowing it to participate in his own activity of existing. Human desire and human will, therefore, as existential acts have no being apart from God. But, (and here is the mystery) God enables free acts to exist that are not blue-printed out by his eternal design, but nonetheless are only possible only as he gives the reality of existence in the human agent to the POSSIBILITY of free acts, as well as the acts themselves performed by said agents. Freedom of response to God or freedom of rejection of God, therefore, are enabled by his own design as he allowes these to participate in his existence.

The tragedy is that the freedom God's own being enables even a sinful act to have existence, in that it partakes in a paltry way of God's own freedom of existence. But the sinful act introduces something into the participatory relationship that is contrary to God's will for his creation and its character. This, of course, does not affect God, because his essence cannot change. But the act that is contrary to God's nature can, and does, disrupt the way one participates in God's life and being.

Hence, God is the sovereign cause of all acts, in that he -- and only he -- enables their existence by his own being. But, what he enables in agents that bear his image is a shadowy reflection of his freedom of act. One which eventuates in the human agent sin freely committed. But that same participation -- graciously bestowed in creation and by God's ongoing sustaining presence -- enables "whosoever will" to respond to him in Christ freely, as well. Here the notion of irrestibility of grace, becomes unnecessary. This response is not a human initiative, for nothing is ultimately based in human initiative. Thanks be to God that in Christ we find ourselves reordered and reclaimed to rightful and transformed participation in God's life.