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| Who
is St. Thomas Aquinas? St. Thomas was born in either 1224 or 25 in a family castle in the area of Italy now known as the Roman Campagna, at that time part of the kingdom of Sicily. Thomas’s parents presented him at the age of five to the Benedictine monks at Monte Cassino, at whose hands he received religious and other basic training. Leaving Monte Cassino around the age of 15 he soon went to the University of Naples, where he studied the seven liberal arts and the natural philosophy of Aristotle. In Naples Thomas had contact with a small group of friars belonging to the recently founded Order of Preachers, the Dominicans, whose habit he received around the age of 19. His family, disappointed at his joining the less-than-prestigious order of beggars, kidnapped him, took him to a family castle and tried to persuade him to abandon his plan to enter this order. Not all the members of his family shared his piety, as one of the means of persuasion was sending a loose woman into his chamber. Thomas drove her out of the room with a burning ember, thus setting the tone for a life of angelic purity. Soon Thomas was able to return to the friars and pursue his Dominican vocation. He did his novitiate in Paris, then moved to Cologne to study under his great mentor St. Albert the Great. One biographer reports that Thomas "had no sooner heard [Master Albert] expound every science with such wondrous depth of wisdom, than he rejoiced exceedingly at having so quickly found that which he had come to seek, one who offered him so unsparingly the fulfillment of his heart’s desire. Thomas now began to be more than ever silent, more than ever assiduous in study and devout in prayer." At the age of 27 St. Thomas began, while continuing his own studies, to lecture at the University of Paris. From this time on, indeed for his remaining 22 years, St.Thomas devoted his entire self, with his astounding intellectual capability, to teaching and writing. His collected works fill 30-40 volumes. Canonized fifty years after his death, St.Thomas was proclaimed a doctor of the Church in 1567. In 1879 Pope Leo XIII declared him the "chief and master" of scholastic doctors, and quoted Cajetan speaking of St. Thomas: "He most venerated the ancient doctors of the Chuch, [and] in a certain way seems to have inherited the intellect of all." The Place of St. Thomas Aquinas in the Curriculum of Christendom College Pope John Paul II, following the tradition of his predecessors, has emphasized the unique role of St. Thomas Aquinas in the intellectual life of the Church. He has said: If today also . . . philosophical and theological reflection is not to rest on an "unstable foundation" which would make it "wavering and superficial," it will have to draw inspiration from the "golden wisdom" of St. Thomas, in order to draw from it the light and vigor it needs to enter deeply into the meaning of what is revealed and to further the progress of the scientific endeavor. Christendom College is committed to a Thomistic educational policy: programs of instruction in philosophy and Sacred Theology shall be taught according to the spirit, method, and principles of the Common Doctor. As is clear from constant attestation by the Holy See, to walk in the intellectual steps of St. Thomas Aquinas is to walk in the light of truth. The point here is not that St. Thomas made no errors, nor that he saw all that there is to see. Rather, his understanding of reality is substantially true. Or put otherwise, more than any other thinker St. Thomas has succeeded in seeing, expressing, and applying the basic principles of theology and philosophy. Christendom shares then the conviction of the Church that following in the footsteps of the common doctor is the best way to form young minds, and to avoid error in Sacred Theology and philosophy.
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