That God is merciful signifies that God gives to His creatures benefits that go beyond the requirements of justice. If we assume, as Thomas does, that existence itself is a good, then God’s mercy is in evidence in His creating us, since none of us had (prior to existing) a right to exist based onContinue reading “God’s (Finite) Mercy”
Tag Archives: faith
God is Just, and Life Still Isn’t Fair
What is required for God to be distributively just? Not very much, according to Thomas Aquinas. It is sufficient that God create a world that makes sense, that obeys reasonable laws, containing things that are well-designed, although never perfectly designed: “Hence Dionysius says (Div. Nom. viii, 4): ‘We must needs see that God is trulyContinue reading “God is Just, and Life Still Isn’t Fair”
“Body, blood, soul, and divinity”
This is the second in a series on the doctrine of transubstantiation. Here I want to focus on further theological reasons for preferring Aristotelian hylomorphism to any kind of substance dualism (like Cartesianism). Here is what the Council of Trent taught about the Eucharist: “In the most blessed sacrament of the Eucharist ‘the body andContinue reading ““Body, blood, soul, and divinity””
Staunch Hylomorphism and Transubstantiation
Aristotelian natural philosophy, also known as “hylomorphism,” has the capacity to treat middle-sized things, like human beings, wafers of bread, and goblet-filling bits of wine, as first-class citizens of our ontology, that is, as substances. Substances, on this view, are unified wholes composed of matter and form, whose substantial forms impose certain powers and potentialitiesContinue reading “Staunch Hylomorphism and Transubstantiation”
The Analytic Thomist 