“All in God is God” & Person Distinctions

Question #14: Can the Catholic claim that anything intrinsic to God is identical to the divine essence be reconciled with the real distinction of persons proclaimed by the Church (e.g., the Fourth Lateran Council)?

Yes. Catholic theology (as I understand it) maintains that anything intrinsic to God is identical to the divine essence–upholding divine simplicity–yet still acknowledges the real distinction of Persons (e.g., the Fourth Lateran Council, which affirms three distinct Persons in one God). The way classical theology reconciles these two affirmations is by recognizing that the distinctions of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are relational, not compositional.

1. Divine Simplicity and the Identicality Thesis

When the Church teaches that anything intrinsic to God is identical to the divine essence, it means that God has no “parts” or “properties” that stand apart from His being. God’s wisdom, power, and love are not “added features” but are simply who God is. Following St. Thomas Aquinas, Catholic tradition calls God actus purus (pure act)–there is no unrealized potency and no division within God’s essence. Consequently, His attributes (e.g., omniscience, omnipotence) are all identical with the single, indivisible divine reality.

2. Real Distinctions Without Parts

The Fourth Lateran Council, along with other Trinitarian definitions, insists on a real distinction between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. These Persons are truly distinct “who’s,” yet the Church also asserts there is one divine “what” or essence. At first glance, identifying all that is in God with His essence could appear to flatten these Person-level distinctions. However, Catholic theology explains that the Trinitarian distinctions arise not from essence + something else, but from relations of origin that do not divide the divine nature into segments.

3. Relations of Origin vs. Composition

Each Person is wholly and fully God; each “is” the one divine essence. But the Father is God “as unbegotten,” the Son is God “as begotten,” and the Spirit is God “as proceeding.” These are relational distinctions–who receives or communicates the essence in a particular relational mode–and they do not constitute “parts” or “attributes” added to God. Thus, the relational difference is intrinsic (it’s within the Godhead itself) yet does not introduce composition: the essence remains fully present in Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, with no subtraction or addition.

4. Preserving Both Doctrine and Mystery

In this view, the very same divine essence is subsisting in three distinct ways, without multiplying or dividing God’s being. Since these distinctions are “modes of relation,” they are indeed intrinsic to God but are not “additional properties” over and above the essence. Hence, Catholic teaching preserves divine simplicity (“anything in God is God”) while honoring the Church’s dogma that there are really three Persons who are not each other. Each Person is the one simple essence from a distinct relational standpoint, and that is precisely the ground of their real distinction.


Thus, the claim that all that is in God is identical with the divine essence can be reconciled with the real distinction of Persons. The key insight is that the relational distinctions are not “parts” or “accidents” but eternal, subsistent relations fully expressing the one divine essence, as defined by the Church’s Trinitarian doctrine.


(see questions #11, #12, #13 for more)