Redeem the Time

In my experience, Thomists of the strict observance believe that Thomism is the hardware that will run any software. And increasingly I have come to suspect that they just may be right. That worthy Dominican, Father Benedict Ashley, somewhere writes that a distinctive contribution of Thomas to the Christian tradition was his insistence that study and the intellectual life are not merely means to an end but an almost sacramental means of the end itself, which is our sanctification. In this way, too, it is the case that to be an educated Catholic is to be in some important sense a Thomist.

-Father Neuhaus, On the Square

The hardware that will run any software. Hah!

In some ways I like the metaphor, but too much software—too much “Catholic” software—is designed so that it won’t run on Thomist hardware. Yet I suppose that sort of software isn’t really software at all. Rather, these are viruses of the trojan horse variety that try to ruin the hardware, or annoying adware and pop-ups that never cease their attempts to prevent you from doing anything with it.

The hollow charges of “rationalism,” hurled against St. Thomas by those who don’t understand him, need to stop if theology wants to be theology again. Hell, you need to understand St. Thomas even if you want to “change culture” and “speak to the modern world” and all the other things that modern theology is always talking about but never doing. Anyhow, its nice to hear the truth—to be an educated Catholic is to be a Thomist in some important sense, but not many Catholics know or admit that. Which makes one wonder how many Catholics are educated.

I am a tired Catholic who needs to go to sleep. Researching land use policy has that effect sometimes. Other times it can be interesting, but then again we must remember that truth and goodness (and beauty—is it kosher for me to say that?) are convertible with being, so anything can be interesting given a nature that naturally desires to know.