The Thomistic Response to the Nouvelle Théologie:
Concerning the Truth of Dogma and the Nature of Theology

With Dr. Jon Kirwan, Ph.D. (Oxon)

The Thomistic Response to the Nouvelle Théologie: Concerning the Truth of Dogma and the Nature of Theology retrieves the most important and largely forgotten exchanges in the mid-20th-century debate surrounding ressourcement thinkers. It makes available new translations of works by the leading Thomists in the exchange: Dominican Fathers Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, Michel Labourdette, Marie-Joseph Nicolas, and Raymond Bruckberger. In addition to a lengthy historical and theological introduction, the volume contains sixteen articles, thirteen of which have never appeared in English. All the major critical responses of the Dominican Thomists to the nouvelle théologie are here presented chronologically according to the primary debates carried on, respectively, in the journals Revue Thomiste and Angelicum. A lengthy introduction describes the unfolding of the entire debate, article by article, and explains and references the ressourcement interventions.

Unfortunately, the history of this important debate is largely surrounded by polemics, half-truths, caricatures, and journalistic soundbites. In the articles gathered in this volume, along with the accompanying introduction, the Toulouse and Roman Dominicans speak in their own voice. The central theses that define the two sides of the debate are sympathetically set forth. However, the texts gathered here show the immense lengths to which the Thomists went to initiate an authentic and fraternal theological dialogue with the nouveaux théologiens. Frs. Labourdette and Nicolas repeatedly argued for the importance of ressourcement work: they applauded its historical efforts, and they were generally sympathetic and complementary (although always pointed and persistent in gently expressing their concerns). Even Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange―whose infamous intervention is remembered as being a theological "atomic bomb"―is revealed as being no more guilty of escalation than the Dominicans' interlocutors in their own responses to him and Fr. Labourdette.

This volume will greatly aid in the task of theological and historical reconstruction and will, undoubtedly, assist in a certain rapprochement between the two sides, as the essential texts, concerns, and theological arguments are made available in their entirety to professional and lay anglophone readers.

Made by God, Made for God: Catholic Morality Explained

What is Catholic morality all about? Is it a list of arbitrary rules imposed upon us by some external authority? Or is it something deeper, something extraordinary, something that reflects our longing for eternal life?

Made by God, Made for God explores the profound beauty of Catholic morality. As Christians, we are remade in Christ, living a truly divine life by following Christ’s new commandment to “love one another; even as I have loved you” (John 13:34).

All that we say and do should reveal our identity as beloved children of God. We are made for eternal life and eternal happiness. And this eternal life begins right now through God’s gift of grace. Catholic morality is about living out this new life in communion with God it is about living our lives with heaven in mind.

Citation:

Matthew K. Minerd, Made by God, Made for God: Catholic Morality Explained (West Chester, PA: Ascension, 2021).

Catholic Dogmatic Theology: A Synthesis

Book 3, On the Church and the Sacraments

(By Fr. Jean-Hervé Nicolas, OP)

Every discipline, including theology, requires a synthetic overview of its acquisitions and open questions, a kind of "topography" to guide the new student and refresh the gaze of specialists. In his Synthèse dogmatique, Fr. Jean-Hervé Nicolas, OP (1910-2001) presents just such a map of Thomistic theology, focusing on the central topics of Dogmatic Theology: The One and Triune God, Christology, Mariology, Ecclesiology, the Sacraments, and the Last Things. Drawing on decades of research and teaching, Fr. Nicolas synthetically presents these topics from a faithfully Thomistic perspective. While broadly and genially engaging the theological literature of the 20th century, he nonetheless remains deeply indebted to the Thomistic school that would have formed him in his youth as a theologian. This provides the reader with an unparalleled theological vision, masterfully bringing forth, at once, what is new and what is classical.

Catholic Theology: A Dogmatic Synthesis is being published in English as a multi-volume work. In this volume, Fr. Nicolas takes up the raison d'être for the mission of the Holy Spirit: the work of sanctification in and through the Church, the mystical body of Christ and sacrament of salvation. In the ecclesiology articulated in this volume, he presents a theology of the Church that is at once wholly Thomistic and also faithful to the great themes of the Second Vatican Council, drawing especially from the works of Journet, Congar, and Bouyer, in critical dialogue with other theologians of his day. He then presents a complete and detailed sacramental theology, both concerning the nature of the sacraments in general, as well as concerning each sacrament in particular, carefully striving to balance positive and scholastic theology.

Serving as a professor for decades, including at the University of Fribourg, Fr. Nicolas was at once a profound scholar and a masterful pedagogue. Gathering the work of a lifetime into a single pedagogical narrative, Fr. Nicolas's Catholic Theology: A Dogmatic Synthesis provides a resource for students and scholars alike. In view of the hyper-specialization of theology today, this series of volumes provides readers with a synthetic and sapiential overview of the fundamentals of dogmatic theology from a robust and profound Thomistic perspective.

About the Author:

Jean-Herve Nicolas, OP (1910-2001) was professor of dogmatics at the Dominican studium of St. Maximin, University of Fribourg, and the Trappist Abbey of Sept-Fons.

Citations:

Jean-Hervé Nicolas, Catholic Dogmatic Theology: A Synthesis Book 3, On the Church and the Sacraments, intro. Joseph Ratzinger, trans. Matthew K. Minerd (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2023).

(Part of:) Jean-Hervé Nicolas, Synthèse dogmatique (Fribourg: Éditions Universitaires, 1985)

Catholic Dogmatic Theology: A Synthesis

Book 2, On the Incarnation and Redemption

(By Fr. Jean-Hervé Nicolas, OP)

Every discipline, including theology, requires a synthetic overview of its acquisitions and open questions, a kind of "topography" to guide the new student and refresh the gaze of specialists. In his Synthèse dogmatique, Fr. Jean-Hervé Nicolas, OP (1910-2001) presents just such a map of Thomistic theology, focusing on the central topics of Dogmatic Theology: The One and Triune God, Christology, Mariology, Ecclesiology, the Sacraments, and the Last Things. Drawing on decades of research and teaching, Fr. Nicolas synthetically presents these topics from a faithfully Thomistic perspective. While broadly and genially engaging the theological literature of the 20th century, he nonetheless remains deeply indebted to the Thomistic school that would have formed him in his youth as a theologian. This provides the reader with an unparalleled theological vision, masterfully bringing forth, at once, what is new and what is classical.

Catholic Theology: A Dogmatic Synthesis will be published in English as a multi-volume work. In this volume, Fr. Nicolas discusses the mysteries of faith directly connected with the Redemptive Incarnation: the formation of orthodox Christological dogma in the course of the first centuries of the Church; the nature of the Hypostatic Union; the latter's effects in Christ's holiness, knowledge, and incarnate activity; the mariological mysteries connected to the divine maternity; the soteriological meaning of Christ's vicarious satisfaction; and the eschatological return of Christ in Glory.

Serving as a professor for decades, including at the University of Fribourg, Fr. Nicolas was at once a profound scholar and a masterful pedagogue. Gathering the work of a lifetime into a single pedagogical narrative, Fr. Nicolas's Catholic Theology: A Dogmatic Synthesis provides a resource for students and scholars alike. In view of the hyper-specialization of theology today, this series of volumes provides readers with a synthetic and sapiential overview of the fundamentals of dogmatic theology from a robust and profound Thomistic perspective.

About the Author:

Jean-Herve Nicolas, OP (1910-2001) was professor of dogmatics at the Dominican studium of St. Maximin, University of Fribourg, and the Trappist Abbey of Sept-Fons.

Citations:

Jean-Hervé Nicolas, Catholic Dogmatic Theology: A Synthesis Book 2, On the Incarnation and Redemption intro. Joseph Ratzinger, trans. Matthew K. Minerd (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2023).

(Part of:) Jean-Hervé Nicolas, Synthèse dogmatique (Fribourg: Éditions Universitaires, 1985)

Confessions

A new edition of the spiritual classic by St. Augustine of Hippo
Translation updated by Matthew K. Minerd
With introductions by Frs. Gregory Pine OP and Jacob Bertrand Janczyk OP

The second book of the Catholic Classics series, The Confessions of St. Augustine, is an updated translation of the key work of Catholic tradition that is accessible for modern readers.

Often considered one of the most influential and inspiring works of the saints, this classic yet relevant text was written by the Doctor of the Church as a prayer to God, confessing his faith despite past mistakes and recognizing the ways that God has transformed his heart. Through the years, it has remained a key reflection on the spiritual life for believers who seek to persevere through weakness toward the glory of heaven.

Exploring topics such as understanding Sacred Scripture, the weakness of the human heart, and the transformative power of an encounter with the living God, this text draws readers ever closer to God through St. Augustine’s conversations with the heavenly Father who called him out of a life of sin and onto the path toward sainthood.

This beautiful book draws all Catholics into a deeper relationship with God in their pursuit of holiness through the honesty, authenticity, and wisdom of one of the Church’s greatest saints.

About the Author:

St. Augustine (354–430), “the Doctor of Grace,” was the bishop of Hippo (in modern day Algeria) and the most influential Father of the Latin Church.

Introduction to the Devout Life

A new edition of the spiritual classic
Translation updated by Matthew K. Minerd
With introductions by Frs. Gregory Pine OP and Jacob Bertrand Janczyk OP

(Winner of 2023 Catholic Media Conference award for best English language translation)

The first book of the Catholic Classics series, Introduction to the Devout Life is an updated translation of St. Francis de Sales’ original text that makes this key work of Catholic Tradition approachable to modern readers…

Written by Doctor of the Church St. Francis de Sales to offer sound preaching and clear instruction for Catholics and translated by Matthew K. Minerd to renew Catholics’ understanding and appreciation of this classic Catholic work, Introduction to the Devout Life promises that “it is possible to have an intimate and personal relationship with Jesus, regardless of the demands of everyday life.” This beautiful book provides inspiration and guidance for all Catholics to deepen their personal relationship with God while living out their unique vocation.

About the Author:

St. Francis de Sales (1567–1622) was the bishop of Geneva, Switzerland and author of a number of spiritual theology texts. In 1877, Bl. Pope Pius IX declared him a Doctor of the Church. Because of his emphasis on the centrality of charity in the Christian life, he is known as the “Doctor of Charity.”

Conscience: Four Thomistic Treatments

Conscience: Four Thomistic Treatments presents a series of distinct essays by the Thomistic scholars Benoît-Henri Merkelbach, Reginald Beaudouin, and Michel Labourdette. Expertly compiled and translated by Matthew K. Minerd, these essays confront the difficulty of assessing the proper locus of conscience in moral theology—a difficulty as palpable today as when debates over casuistry and probabilism raged. Introduced by Minerd’s own expansive overview of conscience, the volume comprises Merkelbach’s “Where Should We Place the Treatise on Conscience in Moral Theology?” (1923) and “Treatise on Conscience in General” (1946); Labourdette’s Comments on Conscience (1940s); and Beaudouin’s De Conscientia (1911).

The seventh volume in the Thomist Tradition series, Conscience: Four Thomistic Treatments offers a technically rigorous, deeply insightful examination of a crucial aspect of moral theology.

About the Authors:

Benoît-Henri Merkelbach, O.P., (1871–1942) was professor of moral theology at the Dom- inican studium in Louvain and the Angelicum in Rome. His Summa theologiae moralis is perhaps the most extensive pre-Second Vatican Council omist manual of moral theology.

Reginald Beaudouin, O.P., (1842–1907) was regent of studies for the Paris Dominicans and socius of the Master General of the Order. He in uenced many luminaries of twentieth-century omism, including Ambroise Gardeil, Pierre Mandonnet, M.-B. Schwalm, and Antonin Sertillanges.

Michel Labourdette, O.P., (1908–1990) was professor of moral theology at the Dominican studium of St. Maximin in Toulouse, editor of the Revue thomiste, and author of many theological studies.

Citations:

Matthew K. Minerd et al., Conscience: Four Thomistic Treatments (Providence, RI: Cluny Media, 2022).

Benoît-Henri Merkelbach, O.P., Summa theologiae moralis, vol. 1(Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1931), 186–206; idem., “Quelle place assigner au traité de la conscience?” Revue des sciences philosophiques et théologiques 12 (1923):170–83;Réginald Beaudouin, Tractatus de conscientia, ed. Ambroise Gardeil (Paris: Gabalda, 1911); Michel Labourdette, Les actes humains (Paris: Parole et Silence, 2016), 204–245.

On Divine Revelation: The Teaching of the Catholic Faith (in Two Volumes)

In On Divine Revelation—one of Garrigou-Lagrange’s most significant works, here available in English for the very first time—he offers a classic treatment of this foundational topic. It is an organized and thorough defense of both the rationality and supernaturality of divine revelation. He presents a careful yet stimulating account of the scientific character of theology, the nature of revelation itself, mystery, dogma, the grace of faith, the powers of human reason, false interpretations thereof (rationalism, naturalism, agnosticism, and pantheism), the motives of credibility, and much more.

Though written a century ago, On Divine Revelation will restore confidence in theology as a distinct and unified science and return focus to the fundamental questions of the doctrine of revelation. It also serves as a salutary corrective to contemporary theology’s anthropocentrism and concern with what is relative in revelation and religious experience by reorienting our theological attention to what is most certain, central, and sure in our knowledge of divine revelation: the Triune God who has revealed his inner life and salvific will.

Readers will see the great splendor of the gift of divine revelation: radiant with credibility before the gaze of reason and drawing our supernatural assent to the mysteries through the gift of faith. As Fr. Cajetan Cuddy, O.P. observes, “On Divine Revelation . . . is a stunning work of inestimable value. No other subsequent work on this topic has come close to meeting it (much less surpassing it).”

About the Author:

Réginald Marie Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. (1877–1964), was a French Catholic theologian and leading Thomist of the twentieth century who taught at the Dominican Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, the Angelicum, in Rome from 1909 to 1960.

Citations:

Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, On Divine Revelation: The Teaching of the Catholic Faith, 2 vols., trans. Matthew K. Minerd (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Academic, 2021); De revelatione per Ecclesiam catholicam proposita (Rome: Desclée et Socii, 1950).

The True Christian Life: Thomistic Reflections on Divinization, Prudence, Religion, and Prayer

Although not well-known in the English-speaking world, Fr. Ambroise Gardeil, OP (1859-1931) was a Dominican of significant influence in French Catholic thought at the turn of the 20th century. Conservative theologians like Frs. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, OP, Michel Labourdette, OP, Jean-Hervé Nicolas, OP and many others hailed him as a careful expositor of the supernaturality of faith, a defender of the theological nature of rational apologetics, and a spiritual master. In his controversial Le Saulchoir: Une école de théologie, Fr. Marie-Dominique Chenu, OP praised Fr. Gardeil as an important Dominican initiator of reforms in historical theology, presenting the latter as a kind of precursor to one of the streams of what is now referred to historically as the "Nouvelle Théologie." And one cannot read the words of Fr. Gardeil's contemporary Fr. Antoine Lemonnyer, OP, without hearing echoes and re-echoes of common cause regarding our lofty spiritual vocation, resounding within the halls of the Saulchoir. With such a broad appeal, it is no surprise that in private correspondence, a young Yves Simon, writing to Jacques Maritain, referred to Fr. Gardeil as "The Great Gardeil."

The True Christian Life provides a thorough and stirring introduction to Fr. Gardeil's work in spiritual theology. The volume was originally published posthumously through the collaboration of Fr. Gardeil's nephew, Fr. Henri-Dominique Gardeil, OP and Jacques Maritain. Fr. Ambroise, prior to beginning work on his masterpiece on spiritual experience, La Structure de l'âme et l'expérience mystique, drafted nearly eight-hundred pages that would have set forth a full presentation of moral-ascetical theology. While drafting this massive work, his reflection on the soul's receptive capacity for grace led him to the two-volume study, La Structure, and he never was able to finish his original designs for a comprehensive study of the Christian moral-spiritual life. Soon after his death, his nephew gathered several essays from the Revue thomiste and Revue des Jeunes, along with a complete-but-unpublished study on prayer. Drafting a lengthy introduction on the basis of Fr. Ambroise's unpublished notes, Fr. Henri-Dominique assembled a volume of moral / spiritual theology that sets out the principles of many important themes: divinization through grace, Christian prudence /conscience, the virtue of religion, devotion, and prayer.

In his In memoriam written after the passing of Fr. Gardeil, Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange emphasized Fr. Gardeil's ability to meditate on a given topic's central principles, like someone who sees the highest peaks that give structure to the entire mountain range of theology. In this volume, the reader will find a clear and rhetorically striking presentation of the central mysteries of the spiritual life, presented with stirring and beautiful rhetoric by a theological master from the Thomist tradition.

About the Author:

Ambrose Gardeil, OP (1859-1931) was a French Dominican friar. He co-founded the Revue Thomiste and influenced many well-known French Dominican theologians.

Citations:

Ambroise Gardeil, The True Christian Life: Thomistic Reflections on Divinization, Prudence, Religion, and Prayer, trans. Matthew K. Minerd (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2021).

Ambroise Gardeil, La vraie vie chrétienne, ed. H.-D. Gardeil (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1935).

Divine Speech in Human Words

Thomistic Engagements with Scripture

(By Fr. Emmanuel Durand, OP)

Is the portrait of God revealed in Scripture fundamentally intelligible? The biblical accounts of God reveal seemingly contradictory themes: God's holiness and narratives telling of his anger; the Divine Omnipotence faced with the Impossible; the suffering Christ upon the Cross and the transcendent Trinity of Persons in God; the unique Savior and the universality of God's salvific will; and so forth. How are we to hold together all of this data without denying any aspect of the mystery of God? Must we give into our ambient culture's sense that the biblical God cannot be taken seriously by truly discerning and rational minds when they try to understand "the Divine"? Or, in the midst of this apparent contradiction, can we find the lines of harmony in the revealed mysteries?

In Divine Speech in Human Words, Fr. Emmanuel Durand unties some of the knots that face us when we reflect on the God of biblical Revelation. In each of the essays gathered here, Fr. Durand sympathetically articulates the tensions and apparent contradictions experienced by contemporary minds as they strive to understand the revealed truth of God. A whole host of topics are covered in this volume: the Cross and the revelation of the Trinity; God's holiness and transcendence; divine immutability and the sorrow of a loving God; Divine Providence and human prayer; the fatherhood of God and eschatology; Christ's way of life; and many others.

Drawing philosophical insights from the Thomistic tradition as his intellectual tools, Fr. Durand nonetheless emphasizes the importance of a properly theological mode of reflection, allowing these issues to be illuminated by the revealed truth of Sacred Scripture. Thus, for each of these difficult topics, he shows that a vital theological response must not limit itself to mere logical rigor but, rather, requires metaphysical insight and, above all, sapiential appreciation of God's revealed word. With such instruments in hand, each essay approaches the tensions of biblical revelation with an eager readiness to show how a thoughtful Thomistic practice of biblical theology can guide faith as it seeks an understanding of both contemporary and perennial theological problems.

About the Author:

Emmanuel Durand, OP, is ordinary professor of theology at the University of Fribourg and the author of ten books.

Citation:

Divine Speech in Human Words: Thomistic Engagements with Scripture, ed. Matthew Minerd, trans. Matthew K. Minerd et al. (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2022).

(No equivalent in French. Collection of essays. I was the primary translator and the general editor for the volume. Translator details: Matthew K. Minerd (chs. 1–5, 7, 9–11, 14–16, and 18–22), Thomas Joseph White, Jeremiah Batram (ch. 6), Matthew Jarvis (ch. 8), John-Baptist Ku (ch. 12) , Thomas-Joseph White (ch. 13), and Michael Culhane (ch. 17)

Catholic Dogmatic Theology: A Synthesis

Book 1, On the Trinitarian Mystery of God

(By Fr. Jean-Hervé Nicolas, OP)

Every discipline, including theology, requires a synthetic overview of its acquisitions and open questions, a kind of "topography" to guide the new student and refresh the gaze of specialists. In his Synthèse dogmatique, Fr. Jean-Hervé Nicolas, OP (1910-2001) presents just such a map of Thomistic theology, focusing on the central topics of Dogmatic Theology: The One and Triune God, Christology, Mariology, Ecclesiology, the Sacraments, and the Last Things. Drawing on decades of research and teaching, Fr. Nicolas synthetically presents these topics from a faithfully Thomistic perspective. While broadly and genially engaging the theological literature of the 20th century, he nonetheless remains deeply indebted to the Thomistic school that would have formed him in his youth as a theologian. This provides the reader with an unparalleled theological vision, masterfully bringing forth, at once, what is new and what is classical.

Catholic Theology: A Dogmatic Synthesis will be published in English as a multi-volume work. In this volume, Fr. Nicolas discusses the nature of theological science and the mystery of the Triune God. At once historically-informed and speculatively-detailed, this volume carefully introduces the reader to classical Thomistic positions concerning the theological articulation of the Trinitarian mystery, including the topic of the divine missions, that is, the sending of the Son and the Spirit in the economy of salvation, thereby providing an important connection between the dogmatic portion of theology and its spiritual / moral concerns. Given the central luminosity of the Trinitarian mystery in the life of faith and in theology, this volume is a pivotal chapter in theological reflection. Indeed, objectively speaking, it is the most important discussion in all of theology.

Serving as a professor for decades, including at the University of Fribourg, Fr. Nicolas was at once a profound scholar and a masterful pedagogue. Gathering the work of a lifetime into a single pedagogical narrative, Fr. Nicolas's Catholic Theology: A Dogmatic Synthesis provides a resource for students and scholars alike. In view of the hyper-specialization of theology today, this series of volumes provides readers with a synthetic and sapiential overview of the fundamentals of dogmatic theology from a robust and profound Thomistic perspective.

About the Author:

Jean-Herve Nicolas, OP (1910-2001) was professor of dogmatics at the Dominican studium of St. Maximin, University of Fribourg, and the Trappist Abbey of Sept-Fons.

Citations:

Jean-Hervé Nicolas, Catholic Dogmatic Theology: A Synthesis Book 1, On the Trinitarian Mystery of God, intro. Joseph Ratzinger, trans. Matthew K. Minerd (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2021).

(Part of:) Jean-Hervé Nicolas, Synthèse dogmatique (Fribourg: Éditions Universitaires, 1985)

Thomistic Common Sense: The Philosophy of Being and the Development of Doctrine

(By Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, OP)

Despite living in an “information age,” we are confronted by the clash of ideologies and a crisis of universal knowledge. The Church is not unaffected by the world’s weariness and similarly faces what Fr. Mauro Gagliardi describes as “the lack of truth, or perhaps better, the disinterest in it.” Today’s philosophical and doctrinal decline are the results of the loss of first principles and a relativistic view of doctrinal development.

This first-time English translation of Fr. Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange’s Le sens commun: La philosophie de l’être et les formules dogmatiques by the acclaimed translator Matthew Minerd couldn’t come at a better time. This book sees the great Dominican master address a variety of fundamental topics that we need to return to and relearn in our day: the relationship between common sense and both philosophy and faith; the proper defense for philosophical realism; the subordination and coordination of philosophical first principles; our natural capacity for knowing God’s existence; and, at length, the problem of dogmatic development.

Although originally written during the Catholic Modernist crisis at the turn of the twentieth century, Thomistic Common Sense is no mere relic of past controversies. Jacques Maritain, for example, while reflecting on his formation as a Thomist, cited it as particularly influential. In our own time, this book serves as a foundational textbook of Thomistic philosophy, communicating its wisdom with clarity, power, and perennial resonance.

About the Author:

Réginald Marie Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. (1877–1964), was a French Catholic theologian and leading Thomist of the twentieth century who taught at the Dominican Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, the Angelicum, in Rome from 1909 to 1960.

Citations:

Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, Thomistic Common Sense: The Philosophy of Being and the Development of Doctrine, trans. Matthew K. Minerd (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Academic, 2021).

Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, Le sens commun: la philosophie de l’être et les formules dogmatiques, 4th ed. (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1936).

The Order of Things: The Realism of the Principle of Finality

(By Fr. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, OP)

The Order of Things: The Realism of the Principle of Finality is an exploration of the metaphysical principle, "Every agent acts for an end. "

In the first part, Fr. Garrigou-Lagrange sets forth the basics of the Aristotelian metaphysics of teleology, defending its place as a central point of metaphysics. After defending its per se nota character, he summarizes a number of main corollaries to the principle, primarily within the perspective established by traditional Thomistic accounts of metaphysics, doing so in a way that is pedagogically sensitive yet speculatively profound.

In the second half of The Order of Things, Garrigou-Lagrange gathers together a number of articles which he had written, each having some connection with themes concerning teleology. Thematically, the texts consider the finality and teleology of the human intellect and will, along with the way that the principle of finality sheds light on certain problems associated with the distinction between faith and reason. Finally, the text ends with an important essay on the principle of the mutual interdependence of causes, causae ad invicem sunt causae, sed in diverso genere.

About the Author:

Réginald Marie Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. (1877–1964), was a French Catholic theologian and leading Thomist of the twentieth century who taught at the Dominican Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas, the Angelicum, in Rome from 1909 to 1960.

Citations:

Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, The Order of Things: The Realism of the Principle of Finality (Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Academic, 2020).

Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange, Le réalisme du principe de finalité (Paris: Desclée de Brouwer, 1932).

Saint Thomas Aquinas: The Person and His Work

(By Fr. Jean-Pierre Torrell, Translated with Dr. Robert Royal)

The presentation of the life and work of any great thinker is a formidable task, even for a renowned scholar. This is all the more the case when such a historical figure is a saint and mystic, such as Friar Thomas Aquinas. In this volume, Fr. Jean-Pierre Torrell, OP, masterfully takes up the strenuous task of presenting such a biography, providing readers with a detailed, scholarly, and profound account of the thirteenth-century theologian whose works have not ceased to draw the attention of both friend and foe! In this volume, Fr. Torrell, an internationally renowned expert on St. Thomas, speaks to neophytes and experts alike: for those new to Thomas's works, he paints an engaging human portrait of Friar Thomas in his historical context; for specialists, he provides a rigorous scholarly account of contemporary research concerning Thomas's life and work. This new edition of Fr. Torrell's widely-lauded text involved significant revision, expansion, and bibliographical updates in light of the latest scholarship. The Catholic University of America Press is pleased to present such an eminent specialist's mature synthesis concerning Friar Thomas Aquinas.

About the Author:

Jean-Pierre Torrell, OP is professor emeritus at the Faculty of Theology at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland.

Citations:

Jean-Pierre Torrell, Saint Thomas Aquinas: The Person and His Work, 3rd ed., trans. Robert Royal and Matthew K. Minerd (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2022).
Jean-Pierre Torrell, Initiation à Saint Thomas D’Aquin: Sa personne et son oeuvre, 3rd ed. (Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 2015).

Varsity Tutors GRE Study Guide

A bit of a blast from the past… I was involved as a “contributing editor” to this study guide while I worked for Varsity Tutors while in graduate school. During those years, I did a lot of writing for their online test question resources (mostly math and verbal reasoning questions, though a bit of computer science, too, as this was in my background. For this volume, I primarily was involved with verbal content.