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Further Defense of Aquinas’s Motion Proof
Daniel Shields briefly responds to the review by John Brungardt of his book, Nature and Nature’s God.
Recovering Aquinas’s Motion Proof
For too long has Aquinas’s motion proof languished in the gaol of a contemporary Thomistic metaphysics unwilling to fully countenance the debt which Aquinas’s metaphysics owes to Aristotelian natural philosophy and unable to recapture the ground taken by materialist, naturalist, or positivist accounts of the cosmos. Shields’s book represents a real jail-break and counterattack.
Martyrs of the Mind
The martyr can let himself be conquered by physical death; the doctor must hold fast to true knowledge so that he is not conquered by intellectual death. And if he does not have such knowledge, he should not become a doctor in the first place. For the theologian, not fortitude, but the truth, will set him free.
The Mathematical Realism of Thomas Aquinas
Jean Rioux has written an admirable synthesis of the main debates in the philosophy of mathematics between those of a largely classical perspective, particularly as in Plato, Aristotle, and Thomas Aquinas, and the whole modern mathematical project begun especially by Cantor.
A Thomistic Defense of St. Joseph's Assumption
Given St. Joseph's pre-eminent nature in the Church and among the angels and saints, second only to the Mother of God, God would bestow the honor of accompanying Him to Heaven as He did for His Blessed Mother.
Aristotelian Hylomorphic Dualism
Hylomorphic dualism manages to keep the best insights from both hylomorphism—its unified account of the human being—and dualism—the immateriality of the intellect—, building a cohesive account of human beings that avoids the problems that arise for other forms of dualism.
All the Kingdoms of the World
Kevin Vallier, in his book All the Kingdoms of the World: On Radical Religious Alternatives to Liberalism, presents the first book-length critique of the contemporary revival of Catholic integralism. Vallier’s work seeks to show the insufficiency of Catholic integralism as well as other religiously motivated anti-liberal theories. Vallier ultimately rejects Catholic integralism because, as he argues, it cannot transition from a liberal order to an integralist one, it is intrinsically unstable, and integralism is fundamentally unjust. Liberals, post-liberals, and integralists will find much to take from this book. Vallier’s arguments set an agenda for integralists to expand and deepen their own philosophical and theological politics.
Matter, Mathematics, and the Laws of Nature
Among the many contributors to the revival of the Aristotelian philosophy of nature in recent decades one must include the work of William Wallace, O.P., Benedict Ashley, O.P., Nancy Cartwright, Robert Koons, William Simpson, Edward Feser, and many others. We can now include Fr. Andrew Younan’s title, Matter and Mathematics. Younan’s work is a refreshing, briskly argued addition to recent debates about the nature of the laws of nature that avoids pointless detours into their details without eschewing their necessary substance.
A Reply to Michèle Mulchahey Regarding My Book on the Sermons of Aquinas
RANDALL B. SMITH
Randall B. Smith (Professor of Theology, University of St. Thomas, Houston) replies to Michèle Mulchahey’s Review in The Thomist 83.3 (2019) of Smith’s book, Reading the Sermons of Thomas Aquinas: A Beginner’s Guide (Emmaus Academic, 2016).
Aquinas on Happiness as an Antidote to Modern Life
CHRISTOPHER J. THOMPSON
In a small section of his famous work, the Summa Theologiae, St. Thomas Aquinas provides us with a basic tutorial on human flourishing. This well-known “treatise on human happiness” forms the skeletal outlines of the dominant desire at the core of every human heart: the inescapable need for happiness, fulfillment, bliss.
St Thomas Aquinas as a Model of Happiness
EDMUND WALDSTEIN, O.Cist.
The Greek historian Herodotus recounts that Solon, the lawgiver of Athens, travelled through the world and saw many things. On travelling through Asia Minor, he visited the fabulously wealthy king Croesus of Lydia. Croesus had his servants show off his many treasures to Solon. Then Croesus asked Solon who the happiest man…
The Life and Times of the Universal Doctor
It was many years ago when I first learned about the android of St. Albert the Great. It is recorded, among other loca, in the oh-so-reliable Supplement to Mr. Chambers's Cyclopædia: or, Universal Dictionary of Arts and Sciences, published in 1753 …
The More than Seven Habits of Highly Holy People
Sullivan’s book is one with which further scholarly and even pastoral engagement is needed. Such were the contexts in which I studied the book, while leading a monthly seminar on Habits and Holiness during the 2021–22 academic year. The participants were diocesan priests in Wichita, and, apart from the fraternity of the group itself, the further purpose of the discussion was to become better ministers of the sacrament of confession towards the end of bearing greater spiritual fruit in the lives of penitents. After reviewing the scope and contents of the work, along with a closer look at some points of detail, I close with some feedback from the monthly seminar.
Intention and Representation: The Case of Thomas Aquinas
JOÃO PINHEIRO DA SILVA
After all, it is a common place in the history of philosophy that Aquinas was, following Aristotle, a realist in various philosophical domains. At the same time, Aquinas helped consolidate “intentio” in the philosophical grammar. We can then pose the question: does Aquinas use of “intentio” lead him down a representationalist path?
Last Supper Metaphysics: The Causality of the Vine and the Branches
URBAN HANNON
Our Lord played a great many different roles at the Last Supper. Inasmuch as he was celebrating a Passover seder, he was just another observant Jew—whereas foretelling his betrayal, he played the prophet, and offering sacrifice, the high priest. He was a parting friend to his apostles…
Aquinas on The Divine Names (Latin-English version)
For the first time, St. Thomas’s exposition of The Divine Names is available commercially in English. This exquisite 549 page volume includes an introduction, endnotes, a table of citations of The Divine Names in other works of Aquinas, and indexes pertaining to Scripture, Persons, and Terms used. …
Recovering the Discarded Image of Man and Woman
Few topics inspire more controversy today than human sexuality and gender identity. There is no shortage of Thomistic reflections on the nature of sexual difference in human persons. Typically, Thomists must navigate between the manifest image of human sexual difference and Aquinas’s assumption of medieval Aristotelian biology (e.g., Nolan or Johnston), on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the post-scientific image of gender adopted in indefinitely diverse ways by our contemporaries. An array of ethical and moral theological literature on marriage, the conjugal act, and the family is ready to hand. …
De Koninck on the Existence of a Science of Metaphysics
In this paper, Dr. Glen Coughlin of Thomas Aquinas College discusses the views of Charles De Koninck about the necessity of proving the existence of immaterial beings before beginning metaphysics.