St. Thomas Aquinas on Doctrine and Salvation

Last month, during two of my hours of Adoration I read Sanctifying Truth: Thomas Aquinas on Christian Holiness by Father Romanus Cessario, OP, published by Magnificat. It's short book, just 95 pages. 

The pages that stood for me were from 74 to 77, in the chapter titled "To Rise into Speculation". I wrote several paragraphs in a notebook to help me remember the connection St. Thomas Aquinas made between assenting to certain doctrines and achieving holiness, and herewith provide some excerpts from those notes:

How does Aquinas come to recognize the article of faith as more than a mere formula on which adherents of the Catholic faith agree? How does he come to recognize that the articles of faith as they appear in the Christian creeds are capable of uniting the believer to the very divine reality, the very Christian mystery that the article affirms?

I remember reading years and years ago an article in the magazine U.S. Catholic in which the author said he saw no purpose in reciting the Nicene Creed at Sunday Mass every week because it did not move him or elicit any emotional, devotional feeling. (At least, that's how I recall the gist of the argument.) 

Father Cessario is explaining how St. Thomas Aquinas relates the recitation and thus the assent to the articles of faith in the Creed to our acceptance of "the broader range of matters that the Church proposes for belief", so that when we proclaim that "Christ is born of the Virgin Mary, suffers under Pontius Pilate, and will come again in glory" we are also proclaiming that we believe that "Mary is the Mother of the Church", etc. As Cessario affirms, "the Creed that we recite every Sunday represents a recognizable body of saving truths to which Catholics assent. This assent of salvific faith carries with it the graces necessary to live in accord with all that the Church holds and teaches." (pp. 73-74)

I think this answers that decades old article I remember reading: it's not our emotions that matter while we recite the Creed, proclaiming that we believe those articles of faith stated in the Creed, but our assent, intellectual and willful, through the grace of faith God gives us, to "all that the Church holds and teaches" as revealed by God.

This implicit assent to the "broader range of matters that the Church proposes for belief" also reminds us that the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed that we profess on Sundays is a symbol of all that we believe as Catholics: it does not mention all of the Seven Sacraments (just Baptism), our doctrine of justification, or other aspects of our faith. We do not proclaim our belief, for example, that the Holy Communion we are about to receive is the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of our Savior, really and sacramentally present under the appearances of bread and wine. But we assent to those beliefs by professing the Creed.

Cessario goes on to state that

Aquinas subordinates the articles of faith to God, who as First Truth energizes them with saving power. This means that when the believer professes the articles of faith, he or she adheres to God himself, First Truth in Being and Speaking. . . . the act of faith reaches beyond the expression of doctrines and brings the believer into contact with God himself. . . . Faith stops not at words but at reality. (p. 75)

The reason these pages are so crucial to Father Cessario's and St. Thomas Aquinas's efforts is that:

The intelligible character of the articles of faith lies at the heart of Aquinas's account of sanctifying truth. The articles have the capacity to unite us to the very mystery which the statement of the article enunciates. . . . In short, the believer is invited to make of the profession of faith a prayer of union between himself and the divine mystery confessed. (p. 77)

And, of course, the believer needs the reality behind what she professes to make that "prayer of union" between her and "the divine mystery" through the gifts and graces of the Holy Spirit: Knowledge and Understanding.

I highly recommend this book which Magnificat describes thus:

Get to know the life and work of Saint Thomas Aquinas, the great Doctor of the Church who dedicated his life to the search for truth.

An inviting introduction to the saint and his insight for all who want to grow holy by immersing themselves in the Divine Truth that is the Word of God.

These insightful reflections from Father Cessario explore the riches of thought that have become known as Thomist theology in a way that makes them accessible to anyone interested in growing closer to the Divine Wisdom that permeates all creation.

Please note that I purchased my copy of the book.

Saint Thomas Aquinas, pray for us!

Image credit (public domain): Icon depicting Constantine I, accompanied by the bishops of the First Council of Nicaea (325), holding the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed of 381.