Saint Thomas Aquinas for Catholics Today
Saint Thomas Aquinas for Catholics Today
After a thorough investigation of the scholarship of Thomas Aquinas, one might contend that only the intellectually stalwart could fully benefit from knowing this great man of the church; this is perhaps true. Likely, not many “average” Christians would choose Aquinas for their bedtime reading, just as most patients would not care to hear the scientific explanation behind the human genome.
Yet, the implication of that discovery, just like the implications for Aquinas’ groundbreaking approach to Christianity, has changed everything.
Disregard for the existence of the “real” world, in all of its natural and nitty-gritty forms, as taught by Aquinas’ predecessors, particularly Plato, and thus Augustine, was the pervasive world view when Aquinas entered the scene. For Aquinas’ predecessors the world was an illusion, and all one could do in life was to prepare for higher reality, the next life. Lack of concern, even contempt, for the physical and natural aspects of human existence had major implications for how people might understand faith and how the church might interpret its mission in the world. If, for example, I believe that the next life is all I need to be concerned with, and all I can strive for, how easy it would be to ignore the pains of injustice and cruelty in this world. If he saw the universe as Plato did, would the church have little regard-- even contempt for-- this world, ignoring any impulse to confront injustice, and to address suffering?
How easy to walk away with a fatalism, an indifference, because “this world is not real anyway.” Additionally, the regard that Aquinas held for the application of reason would require use of a respectful balance in discerning truth. For example, if one’s search for truth never encountered reason, one might be like the preacher who took literally the text from Luke 10: “Behold, I have given you the power ‘to tread upon serpents’ and scorpions and upon the full force of the enemy and nothing will harm you.” (Luke 10:19), and died from snake venom.
For anyone who is a serious student of theology and philosophy, and who endeavors to teach, who could be a finer model and example than the scholar and master, Aquinas? His gifts for synthesizing, analyzing, and distilling the works of great thinkers, holding them to the light of faith and reason, demonstrates pedagogy of highest form. His two summae are unprecedented and inimitable, thus, supreme models for teachers.
How often have people of fragile faith, or none at all, been overcome with awe at the sight of a beautiful sunset, a mountain vista, ocean waves washing over giant rocks, the birth of a child? A world-view, such as Aquinas’, teaches that an encounter with the natural order is, in effect, our first encounter with the “first cause,” the Creator.
Because of Aquinas, the new believer can take his/her natural experience as a tangible indication of the existence of God. Faith, for Aquinas, begins with what our natural sensory experience can see-hear-feel-touch-smell. Although God remains the mystery that Moses encountered in the desert (“I am who I am”), Aquinas departed from the teachings that in as much as denied “the real.” Until Aquinas, it was aberrant to trust one’s experience, and to place one’s “knowing” under the guise of both reason and faith. Today, it is recommended that for best Christian discernment, one filter his/her choices through the authority of Bible, tradition, faith, and reason.
Fundamentally, for Aquinas, human life is meaningful, and we need not despair, for God has given us human reason that, by God’s grace, can assist us to achieve fullest expressions of our God-given gifts.