The Dominican theologian Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225-1274) holds a central place in the tradition of Roman Catholic intellectual and spiritual life. The matrix of Aquinas’s own mystical experiences was the thirty-some years of Dominican ministry and community life that this Neapolitan nobleman began in 1244. We see Aquinas’s spiritual self-understanding reveal his deep personal love … Read more
Fides et Ratio has already prompted some commentators to observe the irony of the Church’s efforts to educate the modern mind. At the end of the last century, the popes had to defend the legitimacy of supernatural faith against the pretensions of secular rationalism; now, at the end of the 20th century, it takes a … Read more
The Dominican theologian Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225-1274) holds a central place in the tradition of Roman Catholic intellectual and spiritual life. The matrix of Aquinas’s own mystical experiences was the thirty-some years of Dominican ministry and community life that this Neapolitan nobleman began in 1244. We see Aquinas’s spiritual self-understanding reveal his deep personal love … Read more
As an authentic expression of magisterial teaching, the encyclical Veritatis splendor enunciates Christian truth for God’s people who live within the economy of faith. Still, as many commentators have observed, the present encyclical also represents a new initiative in the history of magisterial teaching. The Magisterium of course has addressed “the sphere of morals” and … Read more