St Thomas Aquinas, 1225-1274. Angelic Doctor, Feast Jan 28th.

For a safe and sure guide for knowing, understanding and accepting truth, read Thomas. Teachers, students and anyone associated with education or learning would be wise to implore and ask St Thomas for enlightenment and wisdom. Why? Any attainment of knowledge without its proper application can be harmful or healthy. The catholic church has honored this holy man not only for his creative thinking and remarkable holiness but also for his wise usage and blending of his reasoning and believing.

Thomas acknowledged that Jesus Christ was the Truth. He stated that knowing and believing are so intricately joined together that it is impossible to do either one without the other. Knowing is a part of believing, albeit hidden, and believing is a prerequisite for knowledge. It is a scientific and logical fact that one can not know unless one believes. It has nothing to do with God, Christ or religion. It is a simple fact. Only an ordered intelligence will grasp this. Why? It is the principle of life. It is very simple, yet sublime too, and many can not grasp this or care not to admit it. To believe one must want to believe and do it. To believe is an activity. It is more than an assent of the mind.

There is a heavenly wisdom or knowledge that is different from the typical use of human knowledge. The best way to gain this wisdom is authentic fear of God. Scripture reveals that this fear of God comes only from God which is its origin. Fear of God is a gift of God and it is also called respect and reverence for love, truth and honesty. It obeys and is submissive to authority, order, law and sound principles. It follows traditions, allegiances, vows and oaths. It has nothing to do with trepidation and being scared of God. Thomas of Aquinas exhibited and practiced this gift of wisdom in his life and writings. He loved God to fear Him, not feared him to love. It doesn't properly and orderly work that way. Scripture informs us that perfect love cast out fear.

All the doctors held that God is the most knowable reality. No one has more intelligence, truth, knowledge and goodness to share with us than God. Moreover, no knowledge satisfies our longing so abundantly as knowledge of God. Seeing and knowing God will be our perfect joy and eternal happiness in heaven.

It is very sad to say but Christians generally do not fully reveal their religion the way God would have them. Why is that? Ironically, there are approximately only two billion Christians in the world. The rest are not Christians. That is a fact of life. Why do Christians in many manners fail to communicate and reveal Jesus Christ in his astonishing attributes and glory? Why do approximately only 1/3 of the world’s population acknowledge Jesus as Savior? St Thomas has many answers for us. He is also a marvelous example. How can we be so knowledgeable about the things of God but not about God Himself? If we look into Thomas’ life and petition him, we will help gain precious knowledge, insight and wisdom about the eternal Being. He daily manifests himself abundantly but his creatures may not always do the same.

The Order of Preachers, called the Dominicans, have a litany of holy men, women and children that are linked at the end of this site. They are sources of immense inspiration. Their two other doctors, Sts Albert and Catherine of Siena are included at the end. The Dominicans, through the catholic church, have contributed enormously to the secular, the sacred, and the scientific dimensions. St Dominic, their founder, highlighted some of the Order's missions and mandates to the praising (alaban), blessing (bendicen), and the preaching (predican) of God.

Thomas was a kind Dominican scholar who believed faith and reason when used together logically and spiritually (influenced by grace) would enable humanity to know and love God as the angels. St Thomas affirmed that reason, itself, would not allow us to know God personally as a Lover or close Friend. God desires us to share in the divine Spirit fully. He wrote that God is in all things and intimately so . Humankind must use their intellect wisely. Therefore, we should exercise our reason with faith for best results. We should also assent to God. That means to submit our intellect, heart and soul-our total self with faith to God to allow God to capture us and for us to capture God's love.

Aquinas is unquestionably the preeminent spokesperson or main authority of the catholic tradition on reason and faith. He is the patron of many causes and definitely that of catholic schools and those students and adults eager to understand, know and love God with one's whole mind, heart, soul and strength. God has given us our gifts. Consequently, God wants us to be generous using our talents to serve the Almighty and the divine creation.

St Thomas was a philosopher and theologian. His reasoning powers were extraordinary and touched by grace. His faith, reason, and unity of his faith with reason, are revealed in his writings. He was a famous teacher in Europe. He took the works of Aristotle that were most controversial and integrated them into the church’s acceptance without fear. Thomas' ardent prayer was: Lord, lead me in truth. Thomas wanted truth and believed Jesus was the Truth. He found truth from a rational point of view from what Aristotle said and applied it into the service of faith within the catholic faith. Thomas never downplayed his enormous intellectual abilities but he believed that his faith was the force and the gift that would satisfy his soul with knowledge and love of God.

Our Dominican teacher insisted that the truths of faith and those of sense experience are fully compatible and complementary. Some truths, such as that of the mystery of the Incarnation and the Trinity can be known only through revelation, and others, such as that of the composition of material things, only through experience. Thomas held that the existence of God is known through both revelation and reason equally. For him, all knowledge originates in sensation but sense data can be made intelligible only by the work of the intellect. The intellect has a unique feature that elevates thought. To reach this elevation of the highest truths, revelation is necessary. The mind according to St Thomas Aquinas possesses universals that are interdependent on human thought. He opposed Nominalism and Conceptualism that claimed that the mind could act independent of all sense operations.

He wrote exclusively on philosophy, theology and many other related topics. He included the subject of angels that are contained in his masterpiece, the Summa Theologica . This was written to confront and encounter the arguments brought by pagans against philosophy and the theology of Christians.

The angels according to him are pure spirits created by the infinite and inexplicable divine Intelligence. Each angel received from God unique, but limited and finite intelligence. Each of these pure, created spirits is an infinitesimal part, but separate, from the highest, sacred Intelligence, God. Each of the angels has a different and distinct intellect. The varieties and myriads of angels are as vast as the stars in the universe. All of the angels taken together in all their splendor and radiance will give us but a tiny awareness and glimpse of the awesomeness of God's omnipotence.

Naturally, Thomas reasoned that humanity had both body and mind (intelligence). He viewed all human creatures sharing but one type of intellect. This means that all humanity is compared to one angel because every angel is a distinct intelligence (spirit) having different types of intellect from one another.

Homo sapiens is the Latin for humankind or our species or name. However, Thomas deemed that each angel is a specie or type. When we reflect on the total intelligences of all the angels together and humanity, we begin to realize the profound and incredible intelligence of God. This fact is unfathomable, incomparable and incomprehensible.

Thomas believed that Christ, who was born a human being, is God, and took on the same human nature as each of us but in perfect order and operation without losing his divinity. Thus, Thomas tried to know, understand and believe in Jesus. He used with the help of the church his reason and faith. He had an outstanding devotion and love for Jesus. He focused especially on the Holy Eucharist devotion. For this reason, the Pope commissioned Thomas to write on this subject.

His writings on the Eucharist, such as the benediction hymns, Pange Lingua Gloriosi (Sing, My tongue, the Savior’s Glory) and O Salutaris Hostia (O Saving Victim), are treasured by catholics because of their exquisite, angelical touches that move the mind and heart to silent adoration and worship in heartfelt praise and thanksgiving. The lyrics and melodies are simply gorgeous and glorious perhaps because of the ‘real presence ’s power under the appearance of bread and wine. Listen and reflect:

“Sing, my tongue, the Savior’s glory, of his Flesh, the mystery sing;
Of the Blood all price exceeding, shed by our immortal King.
Destined for the world’s redemption, from a noble womb to spring”.

“O saving Victim, open wide the gates of heaven to us below,
Our foes press on from every side; your aid supply, your strength bestow.”

Thomas was truly inspired to write these poems because of his genuine belief. It is one of the central mysteries of Christianity. The Trinity is another. Thomas imparts ironic truth by stating that the divine nature of Jesus is very simple. Human nature is more complex. Thus, one would imagine inasmuch as we are not angels that it would be more easy to get to know Jesus because he was human. Not so! Genuine love is easier and more sublime than knowing because it's more about the nature of God. Reason must, at times, step aside to make acts of love if one is to receive union with God. Again, reason must not step aside when we want to think about Jesus’ physical presence and his life, words, and actions because we are not angels. God has given us a human mind to use in a rational manner. Thomas felt that it was better to love God than to know God, but in this world, seeking truth and believing in it, will lead to love. Both functions are vital and necessary and God will guide us.

The theology of the ‘real presence’ is almost too good to be sacramentally and actual true yet invisible. It is a mystery beyond all mysteries. It states that God who is everywhere is uniquely present in an extraordinary and real manner, both human and divine, when a catholic priest pronounces the words of consecration over bread and wine. Not even the angels can grasp this awesome gift, treasure and reality. Nor could the angels grasp that the God-Man was divine, based on observation alone unless God permitted them to know. In fact, some theologians surmise that the main reason some angels were punished was because of their disobedience to God regarding the divinity of the God-Man, Jesus. How this presence and test were revealed to the angels is theory and speculation.

Based on observation alone there was absolutely nothing about the physical presence of Jesus Christ when he lived on earth that would indicate his divinity to be anything else but only a human being. Wholehearted faith is the submission of the mind and heart fully to a divine presence that is not seen or comprehended completely. It is a test, a challenge, a surrender, a gift and above all a thrilling mystery. It is the substance of things to be hoped for which can not be seen or fully understood. It requires submission. Humility or obedience is required from both humans and angels.

When our church declares that the entire God-Man, Jesus Christ, in his body, soul, blood and divinity is actually present in every tabernacle she is stating a profound mystery. Under the appearance of consecrated bread and reserved after mass, the church declares a sacred mystery which Jesus stated and created. Partaking of this glorious, spiritual bread worthily, whenever we are called, and, acting out our life in imitation of Jesus, our daily food and meal, is at the heart and core of being an authentic Christian.

Thomas was an intellectual genius and his message is contained in an old maxim: Keep it simple, stupid.(Kiss) God wants us to be as innocent as doves and cunning as serpents to handle life and its challenges and demands. We must think logically and rationally and be shrewd as adults but trust, surrender, and believe in God as children to enjoy God and merit heaven as God's gifts and mercy allow.

Toward the end of his life Thomas received an awareness that everything that he had written was quite insignificant compared to what God revealed to him. This heavenly knowledge Thomas received grasped everything according to his limited understanding but to fully understand would have been impossible. To comprehend God in a loving-knowing manner is a heavenly gift. It comforts the heart and enables one to live blissfully. Naturally, one does not see God with one's bodily eyes but one experiences the very essence of God which is love. Thomas was the consummate thinker because he was the consummate lover. He knew that our hearts have its own reason and rationale and grasps things that our mind cannot know because of its limited nature. The nature of God, angels, and creations are precious realities and gifts to treasure in one's mind and heart. They are graces freely bestowed on us to guide everyone in a loving and knowing manner. Divine Providence ordains that we know and love God throughout eternity as we believed and cooperated with God’s plan. That’s the Almighty’s design for all.

It doesn’t matter if thinking leads us to acts of love or if acts of love lead us to thinking. No one is going to become a consummate lover as Thomas only by using one’s mind. It is how an individual uses his thinking process and the gifts God has given to us, that helps determine one’s ability to love. The world is full of intellectual geniuses. The purity of one’s thinking, the chastity of one’s memory and the innocence of one’s living and seeing others are important. It is not easy to become a consummate lover. Intentions alone will not do it. Effort will not do it. It takes pure pleading and incessant sincerity to be free from our imperfect tendencies and human way of thinking. Even with our best efforts and struggles, we retain our own human stamp of imperfection.

Thomas was very close to “historical” purity if such a word exist. Tradition informs us that he continually wore a relic of St Agnes. She was one of the church’s early, consecrated virgins who gave her life for purity. When Jesus stated in the beatitudes that blessed are the pure of heart for they shall see God, he also meant that the pure of heart would think as God because in God, all activity is the same: lovingly united and operating perfectly and eternally.

Contemplative prayer is expression and conversation with God by using one’s complete mind, heart, feeling, and spirit. It is a loving-knowing experience. It can be both active and passive or only active or only passive. When God does all the moving, touching and conversing with us we are being acted upon. We are recipients and are passive. Likewise, when we do all the talking, expression and conversing with God, we are active and we do the initiating. Often, prayer is a mixture of both. St Thomas described the contemplative life with action as the highest and noblest vocation.

His brilliant mind advocated at least five reasons for proving the existence of God. Thomas said that we could prove the existence of God with reason alone but that it was very difficult. He said that one could not disprove that the universe always existed according to human reason. However, there has to be a first cause to have an effect. The ‘cross-over’ from reason to belief requires a bridge-gap that is called faith. It is a gift from God and not a right. The gap between reason and love or between mind and spirit need not be separate although there is an eternity between these because God has established this order in order that justice be satisfied. It is based upon both supernatural and natural law. It states: whatever goes up must come down. In spiritual terms it means what Christ said: whoever humbles himself will be exalted and he who exalts himself will be humble.

God is the immovable first cause of all creation. When creatures turn away or turn from God to sin, God does not turn away from creatures because God the Creator is immovable. Sin puts up barriers or roadblocks so that we can not approach God. Thomas tells us that Christ willed to be tempted by the flesh, the world and the devil for at least three reasons: 1)-to strengthen us, 2) to serve as an Example, 3) to warn all that no one is exempt from temptation, especially holy people. In fact, they are the evil one’s principal prey because of his heinous jealousy toward them. By looking at Jesus’ temptation we gain immense confidence in knowing that we have a Friend that is like us in every way except sin. That fortifies us and can make us impenetrable with God’s strength. It shelters us from harm and sin.

Virtue, grace, and God’s gift help take away that which reduce or limit our knowing, loving or being intimate with the infinite Lover. When we use our mind and heart according to the divine plan, according to Thomas, we are united in love and knowledge and live the very life of God.

According to Thomas Aquinas our intelligence and reasoning powers are God’s gifts. We should use them in believing in the Supreme Being and acting good according to the will of God. We are then fulfilling what God wants of us. No one can fathom the infinite mind and heart of God because God has no limits or limitations. When we think lovingly about God or Jesus Christ, his Son, we are able to be transformed. It can change us according to the image of Jesus Christ, who imparts, implants and impressed himself in our being. When we act as Jesus acted according to God’s plan, we will be recognized as good and holy. St Thomas firmly believed that all Christians make up the mystical body of Christ. It was his great love for the body of Christ that the pope commissioned him to compose the liturgy for the feast of Corpus Christi.

St Thomas was a great teacher and wrote many books about the teachings of the catholic church. He is known for his great love of Jesus in the blessed sacrament. It is his prayers and hymns on the eucharist used today that help us know, love and believe in God.

Reason by itself can not transform us. Any natural action or operation has no penetration into the supernatural domain. The supernatural will always be non-natural. However, a loving thought can help us to be transformed. Love united with our reason has spiritual and transforming divine power. St Thomas’ theory of transformation is that the ultimate goal of the Christian life is the beatific vision. This means an act of seeing. The act of seeing is in heaven. The art of seeing is a natural act and contains no mystery because we can rationalize it and explain it. It is perfectly clear and understood. The act of seeing, however, joins, unites and transforms us through faith on earth in a supernatural manner. It is totally divine and mysterious. No one can adequately explain this phenomenon because it goes beyond reason and explanation. The book entitled: And now I see… Theology of Transformation, by Robert Barron, illustrates and explains that Christianity is, above all, a way of seeing. This book and honoring God in eucharistic devotion as advocated by Thomas are ways about coming to vision through Jesus Christ.

Aquinas’ esteem for Our Lady is as no other. He went so far to say that even if a person should die in mortal sin, the divine Mother has obtained from God a suspension of his sentence and a return of life to do penance with God’s permission. Thomas stated this to indicate that many would have been lost without Mary’s powerful intercession with her Son. He will show mercy if they are not beyond the reaches of God’s inscrutable mercy. This omnipotent mercy does not go beyond the justice of God. However, through Mary, God’s mercy can go immediately through God’s justice when she intercedes.

This example must not be construed to contradict what the church teaches or encourage rash judgment that says people can live in sin with the hope that Mary will deliver them from hell if they should die in that state. The Mother of God has extraordinary power, mercy and favor from the Father, Spirit and Son as no one else. Less any one disputes this grace, they should read the book, Hail Holy Queen by St. Alphonsus Liguori, one of the major Marian doctors.

Listen to what Rengers quotes in his book on The 33 Doctors of the Church -see Sources-about Mary's care for sinners:

"She is endowed with this great privilege, that all sinners, all evil-doers who wholeheartedly hasten to her are saved... and all prayers which are poured forth to her are heard...Come, let us go confidently to this temple of grace, that we may find mercy."

Oh! Mary, the Church, the Angelic and Common Doctor, St Thomas Aquinas, and all the saints proclaim that you are the Glory of Jerusalem, the Joy of Israel, the Honor of your People and the Highest Esteem of our Race.

Even the Doctor of Doctrine, Pope Leo, stated that the Blessed Virgin has so merciful a heart that she deserves not only to be called merciful but mercy itself. All the doctors remarked that Mary, whose Spirit is the same as that of her Son, albeit distinctly different, could never be doubted that she is always inclined to mercy. St Bridget tells us that Mary told her that she is called the Mother of Mercy because God’s mercy made her in that manner for all humankind because we needed it and because God alone is infinitely merciful to all creation.

All the doctors have amazing thoughts, concepts and ideas about Mary. See the two links below and go to the end and beginning of each link respectively to see and listen to what the doctors have said about Mary including St Thomas Aquinas which can be found in no other place.

THE DOCTORS AND ST. MARY (Go to end of the link)


THE DOCTORS' PRESCRIPTIONS-(Go to the beginning of the link)

Aquinas brilliantly succeeded where many failed. He created a philosophical system combining Aristotle, Augustine and other church’s fathers. He built on Averroes, Avicenna and other Islamic scholars. He used Jewish thinkers such as Maimonides and Solomon ben Yehuda. He used all of the above and more and brought it in alignment with the bible and catholic doctrine.

Interest in Thomist philosophy began to revive toward the end of the 19th century. Pope Leo XIII affirmed the Thomist philosophy is the surest guide to Roman Catholic doctrine and discouraged all departures from it. Thomism remains a leading school of contemporary thought. Among the thinkers, Roman Catholic and non-Roman Catholic alike, who have operated within the Thomist framework, have been the French philosophers Jacques Maritain and Etienne Gilson. I am in debt to Microsoft Encarta 98 Encyclopedia for some of the data about Aquinas.

Despite all of his scholarship and the creation of a philosophy which the church has adopted as her very own, Thomas was above all a theologian who used his intellect in service to the church to explain the love of his life, Jesus Christ.

St Thomas would want us to reflect that as often as we receive the Holy Eucharist the life we receive is the same, resurrected life of Jesus and the same life he gave back to Lazarus. This resurrected life is also new life for each of us as often as we believe in him and attempt to find it in the sick, suffering, deceased and needy. It also gives us power to have more confidence in him. It allows us to be patience and trust in Jesus as Martha and Mary did. This powerful new life can also assure us of the tremendous friendship that God extends to each of us coming in such a personal and intimate manner and ever so frequently. Lastly, this new life will cure us spiritually and bodily according to the holy will of God. Every day can be a joyous Easter Sunday with the resurrection of Jesus. It becomes our very own to experience daily if we are believers and lovers of the Eucharist: “Sing, my tongue, the Savior’s glory, of His flesh, the mystery sing!”

Devout Christians are truly Easter people. Resurrection, new life in Christ and Holy Communion are for Thomas like reason and faith-interrelated, interdependent and interconnected. As Holy Thursday is the holiest day of the year, Easter is the most glorious and holiest season of the church. Christmas is the actual tasting of the flesh of God in the sacrament and the solemnity of the birth of the Lord. The resurrected Christ, for those who exercise their faith and reason, is alive in all creation and creatures because of his coming and rising. Of course God is not perceived to those who choose not to believe. Thus we see how powerful faith in Christ really is. It gives us life and nourishment everyday. However, more than life, it gives us eternal life. Eternal life for the Christian is new life. This can not be gained without accepting and believing in Jesus’ words: “I am the Life”.

Faith must be understood much more than the church, the bible and the gospels. Those three gifts help us with our faith. However, God knew that those gifts would not be for everyone immediately. Faith is more about life and love. We immediately receive life when we are born. Love, hopefully, follows soon thereafter. However, what is significant is the seed of faith encompasses all. That is why believers in Jesus are Easter people. We actually become what we believe incredible as it sounds.

The gospels do not mention that Jesus appeared to his mother after his resurrection. Why do saints affirm this? Lovers of Christ use their reason as much as their faith, if not more. Why? It is a sublime gift! St Ignatius of Loyola, one of the greatest mystics of the church and the founder of the Jesuits, although not a doctor yet,(with more to follow) wrote that Jesus first appeared to his mother after the resurrection. Why not? Isn’t that right?

Right reason has to draw this conclusion based on facts. What facts if the gospels doesn’t state it? The fact of life. The fact that Jesus was born in time from Mary indicates that when he rose he would be reborn for his church in her. The physical presence is the first, logical, appearance because that is the way it happened in time. What is true in eternity with God when he became man in Mary must be true in time when he returned to Mary. Why is that? That is because he came first to Mary. God does things in perfect order for lovers and he does things in perfect order for sinners. However, he does things for lovers first. Mary of Magdala, who he first appeared according to scripture, after the resurrection, represents us sinners, struggling to become saints. Mary, his perfect creature and mother, who he first appeared, is based on love and life.

Our spotless Mother is as it were our saint turned as a sinner as Christ became our criminal for our crimes. Christ came for sinners not saints. This is another reason we must love sinners. Logic would have us not to do this but God’s spirit in us, touching us with his holy love, urges us on to embrace others. The Holy Spirit empowers and impregnates us to overlook the sin for the sinners as God has done for us on numerous occasions. Mary, through the Holy Spirit, first did the same for us. The church has designated her as model and Mother.

The sublime use of reason, which is above all creation (for no one in creation among all created things has an intellect as a human being), must submit (be humble) as Christ if they are to gain heaven. This fact is based upon his example and actions as our model. Thomas gently encourages us to think about Jesus often. One of Jesus’ overpowering acts was the raising of Lazarus from the dead after being in the tomb for more than three days. When we use our mind with God’s graces we shall discover many more reasons why Jesus waited four days before bringing Lazarus back to life. Thomas mentions a few reasons quoting from other doctors as a spiritual interpretation for the four-day wait.

The first day could represent those who are powerless to help themselves spiritually. They are dead or separated from the life of the spirit. This could include the possessed or those obsessed by evil. This might include people who have ingrained immoral habits, thoughts or feelings. God’s mercy and providence can help them through the communion of the saints and Christ intervention. They need our prayer desperately and are imprisoned in error, sin and spiritual death.

The second day represents those who are impaired living spiritually because they are oppressed or depressed. Many receive vicious attack by powerful spiritual and human forces. They are constantly being ‘dragged down’. Some may be in a state of depression and trapped and only God’s favor can help them. This group needs professional and spiritual assistance and our prayers and action are greatly needed.

The third day wait by Jesus toward Lazarus could indicate that we must never stop pleading for the suppressed and repressed. They need guidance to gain peace of mind and spirit. Our prayers and goodwill toward those who are in need both spiritually and corporally will be rewarded if we beseech God through the merits of his Son who came down for sinners and the wayward. Many of these people may not be aware that they are supressing and repressing thoughts, feelings and actions that are constantly getting them into physical or spiritual harm and injury. Plead and beg the merciful God to have pity on them.

Lastly, Jesus waited to assist Lazarus for four days to remind us that we need to redouble our trust in his almighty power and that nothing is impossible with God. Millions of creatures suffer from severe trials, temptations, test and even torture and need our prayers. Thomas would have us to petition the good God as Martha and Mary pleaded for their brother despite all the odds.

Praying works miracles, brings people back to spiritual life, opens heaven’s doors and destroys death.

These four days are signs and signals that divine intervention is ready and willing when we implore God for ourselves and those who are in most need of God’s mercy.

Spiritual and physical death is overcome by Jesus’ power. We have his power with our intelligence and grace. St Thomas would have us use our mind in prayer and our soul in supplication. He would urge us to use our heart to beg God to help those who can not help themselves. Finally, our doctor-advocate would ask us to cry to the Blessed Virgin, and the saints to intercede for us with all of our strength, to aid those who have no one to pray for them.



We are blessed and privileged to be a pilgrim on earth and blessed with a faith that has been either passed on to us from others, the church or a gift of God. Treasure that faith faithfully as St Thomas Aquinas advises by acting as him, angelically, as far as it resides in your powers of mind and heart. Our guardian angel is as closed to us as our heartbeat and thoughts. Engage in prayer to love and think more wisely and lovingly:

http://members.tripod.com/~rainstorm_3/index.html

The Summa, Saint Thomas' most notable and scholarly writing is summed up by stating that "In the first part we will treat of God, in the second, of the turning back of spirit-endowed creatures to God, in the third of Christ, Who is in his humanity the way on which we will succeed to God."

There is no way more straight, authentic and narrow than getting to know the humanity of Jesus Christ. Using our reason and faith faithfully daily will illuminate our mind and binds us in our faith in a transforming manner beyond all words and expectations. To be a true lover of God in the fullest sense of the word is to be captured by the loving Creator of all creation and creatures. By allowing ourselves to be captured by God, who infinitely craves us, we will be able to love the Creator fully. Then and only then, will we be able to love all creatures and creation unconditionally and succeed to God in the manner that St Thomas of Aquinas stated.

Fr Christopher Rengers', OFM.Cap., book on The 33 Doctors of the Church has 23 pages on St Thomas and is filled with reflective anecdotes and fascinating stories. One example is that when Thomas was an infant he was sleeping in the same room with his sister who was struck by lightning and died.

Why did his sister die and not Thomas? Where would the church be without St Thomas? In fact, where would the church be without any of us? Each person is precious, unique and has a contributory role to benefit humankind. However, Providence is in charge and no one dies by accident but by a loving Father's hand. It is only by faith, wisdom and trust that creatures can accept this incredible mystery and the mystery of God.

There are many other insights about St Thomas that Father Christopher offers in his book that shows his warmth, charity and generous efforts to all.

To learn about Thomas' teacher St Albert click:
      http://www.doctorsofthecatholicchurch.com/A.html

To view the other great Dominican doctor, St Catherine of Siena, click:
      http://www.doctorsofthecatholicchurch.com/C.html

For an excellent Dominican resource website: click below. This is the same link following St Albert the Great and St Catherine of Siena:http://www.op.org/domcentral/trad/

The subject of angels that St Thomas Aquinas (Angelic Doctor) wrote about is constantly appearing. One such outstanding book which contains authentic Catholic teaching, plus approximately 200 stories of saints and holy people who saw and dealt with angels is Angels and Devils by Joan Carroll Cruz and this if found in the doctoral sources:
      http://www.tanbooks.com/

Tan Books also published: All About The Angels , by Fr. Paul O' Sullivan, a Dominican. This is a charming book that shows how the Angels have assisted people innumerable times in the past and how they continue to help us today-Awesome. Angels are personal, intimate, powerful and lovable for each of us according to our faith, hope and charity and the degree of devotion that we have toward them.

The famous writer G. K. Chesterton has written a classic on St Thomas entitled The Dumb Ox

Thomas' writings also includes the theory of the "just war".

St Thomas Aquinas: His Life and Writings: priest and Doctor of the Church by Dr. Marcellino D'Ambrosia, link below.

Saint Thomas Aquanis

Thomas links:
http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/saintt03.htm
Sound information about angels:
http://saints.catholic.org/angels.html
http://www.raphael.net/


New Information
The below web site contains comprehensive resources on our church, faith, the bible, saints, writings, apologetics, evangelization, family issues, links, and many pertinent services. This superior and highly organized web site (see Table of Content) is a most fascinating site with beautiful prayers, devotions, and really too much to enumerate. A truly universal catholic site.

http://www.ourladyswarriors.org/>

Inasmuch as Thomas wrote on the precious blood, the following information is currently below although not directely related to Thomas.