The Enduring Relevance of St. Thomas Aquinas
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- čas přidán 2. 06. 2024
- Friends, most in contemporary secular culture have probably never heard of the name “Thomas Aquinas.” However, his thought remains more pertinent than ever-not only to theology and philosophy but also to current conversations on how to build a more stable, just, and prosperous political order. Today, we discuss the evergreen genius of St. Thomas Aquinas and how his legacy continues in the life and work of the contemporary Dominican theologian Fr. Paul Murray.
A listener asks, does the devil know that his rebellion is ultimately futile?
00:00 | Intro
01:12 | Bishop Barron in Rome
02:01 | Aquinas’ impact on Bishop Barron’s formation
03:56 | Why medieval thinkers like Aquinas still matter
06:18 | The relationship between metaphysics and ethics
07:29 | God as Being itself rather than as the greatest of beings
12:43 | How God can be both transcendent and immanent
15:58 | God’s non-competitive relationship with Creation
21:29 | Defining true human and social goods
23:00 | Does metaphysical speculation have a role in politics?
25:45 | Fr. Paul Murray, St. Thomas Aquinas, and the Dominican charism
29:54 | Listener question
31:49 | Word on Fire Institute
---Show Notes---
Learn about the Word on Fire Institute: institute.wordonfire.org/
Bishop Robert Barron for Pope!! This man would really secure the future of the Catholic Church!
If everyone knew this, was taught this, this world would already be saved. Access to Bishop Barron, FREE access is vital.
Agreed. God bless Bishop Barron and all those who are involved in word on fire.
Thanks, Bishop, for making Theology accessible to the average Catholic.
My formation growing up was pitiful and pathetic. I’m grateful for this access. God bless BBB , He’s my one and done .
*“Joy is the simplest form of gratitude.”*
- ST. POPE JOHN PAUL II
*-Karl Barth
@@PsalmXCI Where did Bart say that ? ...just curious . I think you may be correct . A comparison of Aquinas / Anselm would be interesting. Aquinas was conscious of human limitation ...he lived with the mystery whereas others live with propositions ..some who speak of him do not seem to be ..have you come across Ed Feser and his debates with Oppy on utube ?
There could be good chance that Pope was quoting late Karl Barth the Reformist theologian. Though I amn't certain I cannot deny.
@@PsalmXCI
Your presence is sincerely appreciated. Big God bless🙏
@@tomgreene1843
Thank you for your gracious presence. Sincere good wishes🙏
Props to the new host. Doing a fanstastic job. Just the right flare/calm.
Thanks Matthew and Bishop Barron and the whole team for creating this wonderful and smart content on such a regular basis!
I have listened to other videos of Bishop Barron deliberating on St. Thomas and on his theology of who God is. This video in particular addressed all nuances in such a complete and succinct matter. I wish I had been taught all of this ages ago but I am grateful that it is being taught now. This never gets old and my soul leaps for joy whenever I hear Bishop Barron teach on this. I have a strong feeling this video will be one for the ages. Thank you!
True✨⭐👍
Absolutely agree. This conversation, lecture, explication, is breathtaking. Thank you, Bishop Barron and Word on Fire.
So happy you’re in the world with me . Game changer. Thank you.
A great explanation of the philosophy of Saint Thomas Aquinas. The argument for contingency is especially instructive. Thank-you Bishop Barron.
The best way to understand Aristotle is through the commentaries of Aquinas.
My favorite person to hear in the entire world
St. Thomas Aquinas theologian and philosopher Patron Saint of universities and colleges, pray for us and the whole world ✨🙏
As a born protestant who always had doubts if Protestantism is any more than a middle class ethics I have to say that for Europe/the West Thomas cannot be overrated from a general pov with respect to ethics, morals, law, culture and civilization.
I have left out theology bc, as said, I‘m not a Catholic. My bridge to him was economics, being a retired prof of economics.
Thank you.
I came across Bishop Robert by chance in searching on Catholic theology. His deep knowledge of theology and philosophy has really opened up my spiritual life and want to study the catholic philosphers and theologians. His erudite explanations of catholic theology is wonderful and would convert anyone to the true religion.
Ite ad Thomam, Glory to St. Thomas Aquinas and the Thomistic school!
Thank you, dear Bishop Barron and Matthew; a fascinating, captivating and illuminating discussion.
Sounds fantastic! Is there a way to access and read Bishop Barron's paper?
Wow, listening to this, extremely proud to be Catholic!
love the new host :))
This is fabulous! I've always wanted to study Aquinas, but for various reasons, have not, as yet, been able to. Thank you Bishop, for this!! 🙏🏼
I can only imagine the beautiful prayers that the Good Doctor is sending the Lord's way for your intentions and for the continued success of your ministry, dear Bishop Barron'. :)
You could read Bishop Barron's book: 'Thomas Aquinas: Spiritual Master.' It's a very readable and understandable introduction to one of the Church's most important philosopher/ theologions.
"The Politics of the Real" by DC Schindler. Whoa!
Looks like an interesting topic...St. Thomas can reach philosophers and academics even today...thanks for your great work! Blessings!
A young person's introduction to philosophy absolutely matters. Shortly after I was confirmed in the church, around age 15, I started reading Nietzsche and found him thrillingly subversive. This ignited a lifelong love of philosophy in me (it was my undergraduate major) but it also led me away from Christianity and Catholicism for 30 years. I've only recently returned. If I'd had a more traditional introduction to philosophy -- starting with Plato and Aristotle, with an appreciation for teleology and metaphysics -- I may have been able to read Nietzsche, Marx, Foucault et al. a little more critically. Today, I fear a lot of young men are following a similar path I did and embracing the atheistic "vitalist" right. It would be wonderful if a (preferably young) Catholic philosopher or theologian figured out a way to reach young people who are interested in philosophy and introduce them to the subject through, e.g. Aquinas.
Disgarding medieval philosophy merely because it is from a long time ago is like an engineer betraying the first calculation he made.
So clear and passionate. Thank you 🙏
O merciful God
Grant that I may eagerly desire
Carefully search out
Truthfully acknowledge
And ever perfectly
Fulfill all things that are pleasing to thee
To the praise and glory
Of thy name.
St. Thomas Aquinas, pray for us.
Father, thank you so much, i was an atheist, but now i have to admit, all make sence, and truly Jesus is the Lord.thank and may God bless you.
I personally love the Douay Reims translation of Exodus 3:14 which goes 'I am who am'. Am being the verb for being itself. Lovely discussion as always.
Your Grace , please don’t allow the TLM to be snuffed out. It is such a beautiful thing that so many have yet to experience. I do not mean that it is “better” than the Novus Ordo or to create divide. It would be so sad to lose it, I can only speak for myself, the TLM totally change my relationship with Christ. It awoken my spirit to yearn for Christ and to deepen my faith and understanding of Christ and the Church. Attending daily TLM fills me with purpose, the strength to try and be a more holy man.
We are learning still more. We are not meant to be reporters only, but creators.
Simply outstanding
Thank you for sharing this video today with me awesome God bless you and all those who were listening so helpful and for spiritual growth as well. God' bless you also for having this video and asking beautiful questions too. Well done 💯.
From Doral, FL! 🙌🏻🔥
A strange question, perhaps, but I wonder if Jordan Peterson has read Aquinas. He talks a lot, of course, about Nietzsche and Jung (and Freud and Marx, etc ,) but I've never heard him talk about Aquinas, (apart from when the good bishop here brings him up). I'd just be interested to know his thoughts on Aquinas. :)
Ok, awesome! I now feel less overwhelmed and better equipped to dive right into the Summa! Bless you Bishop and your beautiful ministry! 📖 🙏🏼✝️🕊️🌹
Thank you for the video.
Whoa, slow down! Thank you, great conversation.
"I am who am" The sheer joy of being in this zone of joy and happiness is a tremendous feeling of positivity. To know that the joy and happiness that "He who is" transfers to us is so abundant that all our hunger and thirst is sated. Thanks be to God for this offering of joy and all we have to do is open ourselves to his love like a child whose full trust is placed in the parent.
"I am who I am" is not a gender specific declaration. S/he is neither male nor female.
Message just in time for direction moving forward in the kingdom of heaven now
Amazing episode
Nice new microphones, they look good, they sound good. I like them
So glad to have a copy of the Summa Theologica, and I also want to some day get the Summa Contra Gentiles. Both are invaluable treasures to both philosophy and theology.
Charity Hope and Faith...Fortitude, Temperance, Prudence and Justice
Another thought provoking discussion. I feel the answer to the probing question toward the end was insufficient, however. Lucifer's fall when he began focusing on his own "perfections" rather than God's and substituted God's creation for God Himself. "His pride has cast him out of heaven ..." which is another way of saying "his idolatry has cast him out of heaven." "God hates the proud, but shows mercy to the humble." And so the serpent presented our first parents with the first, most persistent and most powerful of temptations, "You shall be as God, knowing good from evil." Heaven is large enough to encompass all of God's creation, but far too small to welcome another god."
Do any Catholics discuss consciousness. I feel like it’s the massive elephant in the room no one is talking about
Good analogy on Shakespeare
if it is true! but seems like it is pushed to seem to be the greatest, there were greater writers in spanish
I think it's interesting how you say Luther should have taught grace first instead of grace alone. Do you think that applies to sola scriptura as well--i.e. "scripture first" instead of "scripture alone"?
Sola No. Prima Yes. 🙄🤔🤓
Where is the host we have seen for years?!
Every time I watch Word on Fire program one question ocurres to me: why there is not a single cross visible? Why do they use strange gold ornaments (in Bishop´s weekly sermons) instead of the basic Christianity sign - a cross?
What does Bishop Barron think of this passage in Aquinas’ Summa Theologica on treatment/extermination of heretics? “I answer that, With regard to heretics two points must be observed: one, on their own side; the other, on the side of the Church. On their own side there is the sin, whereby they deserve not only to be separated from the Church by excommunication, but also to be severed from the world by death. For it is a much graver matter to corrupt the faith which quickens the soul, than to forge money, which supports temporal life. Wherefore if forgers of money and other evil-doers are forthwith condemned to death by the secular authority, much more reason is there for heretics, as soon as they are convicted of heresy, to be not only excommunicated but even put to death. On the part of the Church, however, there is mercy which looks to the conversion of the wanderer, wherefore she condemns not at once, but “after the first and second admonition,” as the Apostle directs: after that, if he is yet stubborn, the Church no longer hoping for his conversion, looks to the salvation of others, by excommunicating him and separating him from the Church, and furthermore delivers him to the secular tribunal to be exterminated thereby from the world by death.”
poor Aquinas....he has done his best, we can not do better even today where we all have so much access to knowledge that it is a shame we all are not scientists!
Unrelated to the video, but is there further reading on the Bible after you finished it? Like supplementary stuff?
There is the book Principles of Biblical Interpretation by Louis Berkhof. There are many books on Biblical textual criticisms, which outlines how the original text and meanings of scripture are recovered. John Barton’s book entitled A History of the Bible is also excellent for understanding how the Bible as we know it came into existence. There is no shortage of follow-up material. Enjoy the journey into a deeper understanding of scripture.
“ old man”?! You are gorgeous.
PLEASE PRAY FOR ARIAN 6 YEAHRS AUTIST LOST SINCE 6 DAYS
Praying that with the help of Saint Anthony the patron saint of lost things he'll be found 🙏
Jesus of Nazareth have mercy on me a sinner ✝️
The Catholic Church has always looked to Aquinas to guide her theology (as indeed she has Augustine). But truth be told, until a man actually acknowledges "the Lord's manifestation of Himself to him" (see John 14:21), or unless the Church has accepted such a testimony of this defining revelation of the truth (ref John 8:31-32), Christ's presence "with us" will always remain "in mystery" unknown to her. As such, Her theology and eschatology falls short, wanting, searching but never finding, essentially because she has deemed fit to avoid "that which is too much to bear" (ref John 16:12-16). Yet it is this defining `manifestation of the Lord's residing Presence` (in keeping with the Blessed Sacrament of the `Real Presence`) which alone reveals the truth Itself (ref John 8:32), "as made known to the saints" of the Apostle's era (see Col 1:26), causing them, like Job, "to fallen down in dust and ashes before God" (Job 42:5-6). Indeed, Aquinas suddenly stopped writing his `Summa Theologica` and declared to his friend, "I can write no more. All that I have hitherto written seems to me nothing but straw." Aptly, this enlightened moment (inspired by God) happened as Aquinas was writing his treatise on the Sacrament of Penance.
Comment for traction
Bring back monarchism as an acceptable alternative.
No one of us can be free of doubt always. Saint Thomas Acquinas had to spend a lot of time only in his head while coming up with his own healthy world view. No one can make the perfect mind map representing it to worship that describes anything and everything of concern while at the same time nothing which can be seen at all. Does that mean none of us are should ever allowed to make a mind map in hopes that could in a very rudimentary way help us move in our thinking from only being a wanderer while the only goal we have at the time beyond being clueless about what is the best of everything worth valuing outside of us meant to be for us while we are coping with a lot of pain and chaos around us often like when often being a forced migrant? In a way Terry Fox was a forced migrant often needing to prove that he was not a dead beat at the time with the victim mindset after he tested negative for Cancer after he was treated for it the first time. While nobody at the time had any answers at all as to why he got that Cancer in the first place. In North America for hundreds of years or longer people like to draw a picture of the tree of life only because we like drawing in the sand.
So, this is the most random comment you're going to see here lol. I really wanted a native english speaker to practice the language with, and I thought maybe the kind of practicing-buddy that would be nice, could be around these lands 🤣 considering the topics I would like to discuss, a catholic person interested in social, political, doctrinal matters would be ideal.
I would like to understand if bishop barron construes miracle as non competitive in the natural world ... ? I can understand this idea of non-competitivity for the idea like ''the cause of causality itself'' etc. but when it comes to miracles, someone's pushing someone else outside of that chair ... no? Jesus's unliving cells got replaced by living ones, no? Or are we talking different things?
Didn't the Church in those times tortured and burned alive non-believers?
Bad men have existed for centuries. The church remains and its truth does too.
Why not name these so called “philosophers? +
Jesus is God’s being?
John Paul II said the enduring work of Aquinas was to be valued ...he did not say all ...Aquinas was a great and subtle thinker of his time ...many who wrote about him were not... his arguments on God were meant to be substantial and persuasive not proofs in the mathematical sense.
Xóchitl eres el futuro de Mexico. Adelante te apoyamos
Which is more revelent understanding other human beings of today!!! What is the reverence of Aquinas, jesus knew the hearts of men, thats the big difference. Church fathers have no such insights as jesus into human nature.
I LOVE Patriarch people too much
Im not jordan peterson who will listen to these seminars
The bishop's defintion of God is classic theological double-speak. God is a "person" who has desires and makes plans. However, god is also the pure expression of the concept of being - pure "to be ness." Being is a state or condition of an existing entity, just as motion is a state of a moving object. To say that there can be a state of being separate from the presence of existing objects is as nonsensical as saying that motion exists in a space totally devoid of the presence of moving objects. or "redness" in an environment from which all the relevant wave lengths of light are absent. This definition of deity is a reflection of the fact that operational space for god is shrinking as man's understanding of the structure and operating principles of the universe grows. Barrons' claim that god is non competitive with his creation also is not supported by the Bible, in which he describes himself as a "jealous" god, and is insistent that people have no other gods before him. God has preferences, and makes plans: obviously he is very concerned about the progress of his plan for human salvation. It is also difficult to reconcile the notion of an omnipotent being with a need to plan: making a plan is a tacit adminsion that the planner is dependent upon contingencies outside his control and the provision of resources beyond his immediate reach. Also the fact that - according to Catholic doctrine - a lot of people are going to end up in Hell suggests that the divine plan is not working out too well. One final point: a person's cosmology has an essential effect on his philosophy. Aquinas appears to subscribe to a Ptolemaic cosmology, in which the earth is the centre of the universe and the most significant body in it. Hence, it can be presumed that the inhabitants of the earth are likewise very significant creatures. Today it is known and generally accepted that the universe is incomprehensibly vast and contains billions of galaxies, potentially with millions of solar systems just like the one we inhabit. We understand now that humanity is a infinitesimally small aspect of a universe which we do not have the capacity to measure in full. Aquinas' universe, like Dante's in The Divine Comedy, seems extremely confined and cramped - and run on very bureaucratic lines.
Enough Gish galloping.
@@AndrewTheMandrew531 Couldn't agree more.
Your criticisms are like jabs with a knife at an invisible being. None hit the mark.
@@outofoblivionproductions4015 Exactly - there is no mark to hit.
blasphemy chatolics
Yeah, we’ve heard that before. From Gnostics, Arians. Jesus heard it from his Jewish contemporaries. God bless
Heretic Protestant
Unfortunately the majority of philosophers today regard Aquinas's arguments for a god as not valid and sound.
They aren't valid and sound. However, what I remember St. Thomas for is that he stopped writing and pretty much stopped talking for the last three years of his life. He said: “The end of my labors has come. All that I have written appears to be as so much straw after the things that have been revealed to me.” Bishop Barron obviously hasn't copied St. Thomas. Would be better if BB did.
Academics aren't as smart on specific things as we think due to the hyperspecialisation these days. Philosophers of religion are much more sympathetic than philosophers in general.
At least some of their disagreement is due to not understanding St. Thomas’s terms, which are largely definitionally based on Aristotle’s language. Plus his Latin can be difficult to translate. Today’s philosophers do a grave disservice by writing him off. The argument from contingency is still one of the most sound argument’s for God’s existence.
@@FrancesRobinson-yn2ks In other words, you’re saying it’s good that Aquinas stopped writing and Bishop Barron should shut up.
Scientists, Philosophers, and Psychologists today can’t even define what a woman is. I think I’ll go with St. Thomas.