Only God can create space/time ex nihilo.
It is even more astonishing because physical causation itself relies on space/time: in the absence of time, events cannot occur and in the absence of space, things cannot exist. All cosmologies require space/time for causation.
But it wasn't the only possible statement.
Only God can create space/time ex nihilo
Well, with God anything is possible, including that the universe was created as is. God doesn't need space/time to create. Besides, a periodic (oscilating) universe would keep re-creacting itself in a perpetuum mobile fashion without any need of God. Each repetition would be the 'beginning.'