Catholicism 101

St. Thomas Aquinas: Five Lessons for Sanctity

January 28, 2020
Gerard DeAngelis
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Since antiquity, Christianity has been criticized as being an oppressive set of rules that forces mankind into a single, narrow life contrary to human flourishing. Against such criticisms, however, stands the witness of the saints.

Even a cursory glance at any list of Catholic saints will present manifold different people—paupers and kings, scholars and illiterates, children and the elderly, religious and laity. They all served the Lord in many different ways: serving the poor, teaching the ignorant, raising their family, or shaping their nation.

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One saint who for many might not at first glance fit the expected “type” of a Catholic saint due to his complex, dry, and matter-of-fact theology is St. Thomas Aquinas. St. Thomas, therefore, reminds us that every person, not only certain people who seem somehow “cut out for it,” are called to be saints.

On this feast day of St. Thomas Aquinas, then, let us take five anecdotes from St. Thomas’s life that everyone can learn from to advance in sanctity:

  1. The one thing necessary: One day Reginald, Thomas’ scribe and friend, peaked into the chapel to see Thomas with his head rested against the tabernacle praying. Suddenly, the voice of God came down: “Thou hast written well of me, Thomas. What shall be thy reward?” St. Thomas’ response is the anthem of every saint every moment of their lives: “Nothing if not you, Lord.” This is the primary insight into the Christian worldview: there are many great things he could have asked for—to end world hunger, to stop all wars, to give every person a home—yet Thomas realized that attaining all these things would mean nothing if he first did not possess Christ.
  2. Him alone shall I serve: When Aquinas joined the Dominicans, the order of priests was new and extremely controversial. Those who joined the order would live in total poverty, roaming from town to town. It is no wonder then that when he expressed his intentions to join the Dominicans to his parents and brothers, they strongly opposed his joining. They even went as far as to kidnap him, strip him of his habit, and lock him in the family castle. Against the pressure even of his closest family whom he loved, he remembered the words of the Lord to seek Him above all things: “He that loveth father or mother more than me, is not worthy of me” (Mt. 10:37).
  3. Resist evil firmly and unflinchingly: When Aquinas did not flinch from his resolve after being locked in the tower, in a desperate last attempt to dissuade him from staying in the order his brothers devised to send a prostitute into his room to tempt his vow of chastity. Upon seeing the prostitute enter the door, St. Thomas grabbed a glowing hot fire-band from the fire, chased her out of the room, and burned the sign of the cross on his door. Aquinas here reminds us of how we should treat evil: not entertaining it for even a second but chasing it out immediately, burning over it the sign of the cross.
  4. Love of the Eucharist: Thomas had an immense dedication both intellectually to understanding the mystery of the Eucharist and personally to spreading the love of Christ under this sacrament. In his theology, he presents what the Church has dogmatically defined as the “most apt” description of the Eucharist (Trent XIII, II). Further, his deep personal love for the Eucharist is clear from the beautiful Corpus Christi hymns he wrote that we still sing in Church today (the Tantum Ergo or “Down in Adoration” and the Adoro Te Devote are just two examples). As Catholics, we believe the most radical claim of any religion: that God takes the appearance of a piece of bread for us to approach and worship Him. Let us never take this great gift for granted.
  5. Stay humble: One day St. Thomas visited St. Bonaventure, a contemporary Franciscan theologian, and remarked how impressed he was with Bonaventure’s writing, asking what books he had acquired such knowledge from. In reply, St. Bonaventure pulled away a curtain above his desk, exposing a crucifix blackened with kisses. He replied: “Here, Father, are all my other books; this is the book from which I draw all I teach, and all I write.” It turns out even Aquinas needed holy friends to keep him humble and remind him of what is most important.

St. Thomas Aquinas, pray for us!

Feature image courtesy of Nheyob via Wikimedia.

Gerard DeAngelis
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