God's Goodness

About this episode

This episode explores the nature of God's goodness, arguing that God is Goodness Itself rather than merely conforming to moral standards.

Is God good because He follows moral rules—or is He goodness itself? All Christians confess that God is good. But what does that actually mean? In this episode, Anthony Alberino challenges the modern assumption that divine goodness is simply maximal moral perfection and show why that view leads straight into a classic philosophical dilemma. Drawing from Aristotle, Aquinas, and the classical Christian tradition, this episode argues that God’s goodness is not a moral property He possesses, but something far deeper: God is Goodness Itself. We explore: Why the modern “moral perfection” view of God collapses into an Euthyphro-style dilemma The classical metaphysical account of goodness as teleological, perfective, and convertible with being Why goodness is not primarily moral, but ontological How perfection, actuality, and existence ground all goodness Why evil is not a thing, but a privation of due good How moral goodness depends on a deeper metaphysical structure Why God must be infinitely good—not by character, but by nature How God, as Goodness Itself, is the Final Cause and ultimate end of all desire This episode shows why, on the classical view, God cannot fail to be good—not…

People in this episode

Hosts: Dr. Anthony Alberino, Dr. Andrew Payne

Topics covered

• Divine Goodness
• moral perfection
• classical metaphysics
• ontological goodness
• evil as privation
• God as Being Itself

Keywords

• God's goodness
• moral rules
• philosophical dilemma
• classical theology
• metaphysical structure
• perfection
• evil
• desire

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: Euthyphro

More episodes of Think for Christ

• On Neoplatonism with Dr. Michael Wiitala · June 10, 2026 · 1h 7m
• On Plato and Platonism with Dr. Michael Wiitala · May 25, 2026 · 1h 6m
• God's Eternity · May 2, 2026 · 11 min
• God's Immutability and Impassibility · March 9, 2026 · 19 min
• The Democratization of Information and the Crisis of Discernment · January 12, 2026 · 17 min
• Goodness, Authority, and God — A Deep Dive with Philosopher Pat Flynn · December 17, 2025 · 1h 1m