Vatican I, Dogmatic Constitution Dei Filius on the Catholic Faith

First Vatican Council: Dogmatic Constitution on the Catholic Faith

The Holy, Catholic, Apostolic, and Roman Church believes and acknowledges that there is one true and living God, creator and Lord of heaven and earth, almighty, eternal, immeasurable, incomprehensible, infinite in understanding, will and every perfection. Since He is a one unique, completely simple and unchangeable spiritual substance, He must be declared to be, in reality and in essence, distinct from the world, supremely happy in and from Himself, and inexpressibly loftier than anything else which exists or can be imagined.

This one true God, in his goodness and almighty power and by an absolutely free plan, at the beginning of time created from nothing both spiritual and material creation, that is to say angelic and earthly, and then created human beings composed as it were of both spirit and body in common.. He created not to obtain or increase his own happiness, but to show forth his perfection in the goods which He bestows upon His creatures.

Indeed, God protects and governs by his providence all that He has created, reaching from one end of the earth to the other and ordering all things well. All things are open and laid bare to his eyes, even those which will take place by the free action of creatures.