The One Creator God in Thomas Aquinas and Contemporary Theology (Sacra Doctrina)

by Michael J. Dodds

Publisher:

Catholic University of America

, 2020

Overview

This book provides a fundamental introduction to Aquinas's theology of the One Creator God. Aimed at making that thought accessible to contemporary audiences, it gives a basic explanation of his theology while showing its compatibility with contemporary science and its relevance to current theological issues. Opening with a brief account of Aquinas’s life, it then describes the purpose and nature of the Summa Theologica and gives a short review of current varieties of Thomism. Without neglecting other works, it then focuses primarily on the discussion of the One God in the first part of the Summa Theologica. God's transcendence and immanence is a recurrent theme in that discussion. Evidence of God's immanent causality in the natural world grounds Aquinas's five arguments for the existence of God (the Five Ways) which then open onto God's transcendence. The subsequent discussion of the divine attributes builds on the modes of God's causality established in the Five Ways. It also shows the need for a language of analogy to preserve God's transcendence and prevent us from reducing God to the level of creatures, even as qualities such as "goodness" and "love," which we first know from creatures, are applied to God. The discussion of God's providence and governance establishes that the transcendent Creator God is most intimately present in creation. God acts in all creatures in a way that does not diminish their proper causality, but is rather its source. As there is no contradiction between God's transcendence and immanence, so there is no competition between the primary causality of God and the secondary causality of creatures. Empirical science, which is limited by its method to the secondary causality of creatures, is shown to be compatible with the broader discipline of theology which also embraces the primary causality of the Creator.

• Focuses primarily on the discussion of the One God
• Describes the purpose and nature of the Summa Theologica
• Explains Aquina's theology and its compability with contemporary science and its relevance to current theological issues

Contents

• The Existence of God
• Divine Attributes
• Knowing and Naming God
• Divine Knowledge and Life
• Divine Will
• Divine Love, Justice, and Compassion
• Divine Providence
• Divine Power
• Divine Beatitude
• Creation and Divine Action

Praise for The One Creator God in Thomas Aquinas and Contemporary Theology

Dodds provides a well-written, accessible summary of St. Thomas’ teaching on the doctrine of God while also making a significant contribution in placing this doctrine in dialogue with contemporary science and scientific sensibilities.

Jessica M. Murdoch, Villanova University

This book is a splendid account of what Aquinas has to say about the existence and nature of God in the first part of his Summa Theologiae. Yet the book is not simply concerned to report on what Aquinas says. It pays much attention to published criticisms of Aquinas and discusses them with great philosophical and theological expertise. Michael J. Dodds has a lot of good things to say about how, in the light of recent science, we should evaluate Aquinas’s thinking about God. Anyone seriously interested in Aquinas will learn a great deal.

Brian Davies, Fordham University

Modernity and its offspring have wreaked havoc on the doctrine of God in recent Christian theology. Michael J. Dodds convincingly demonstrates the abiding relevance and superiority of Thomas Aquinas’s teaching on God by setting it forth in thoughtful engagement with contemporary alternatives. His rehabilitation of the Angelic Doctor’s profound insight on God’s transcendence and immanence is precisely the cure for modern theology’s diminished theism.

James E. Dolezal, Cairn University

Product Details

• Title: The One Creator God in Thomas Aquinas & Contemporary Theology
• Author: Michael J. Dodds
• Series: Sacra Doctrina Series
• Publisher: Catholic University of America
• Print Publication Date: 2020
• Logos Release Date: 2022
• Pages: 229
• Era: era:contemporary
• Language: English
• Resources: 1
• Format: Digital › Logos Reader Edition
• Subjects: God (Christianity) › History of doctrines; Thomas, Aquinas, Saint, 1225?-1274; Catholic Church › Doctrines--History
• ISBNs: 9780813232874, 9780813232881, 0813232872, 0813232880
• Resource ID: LLS:NCRTRCNTMPRRYTH
• Resource Type: Monograph
• Metadata Last Updated: 2024-03-25T20:25:50Z

About Michael J. Dodds

How do we talk about God? How do we speak of one who infinitely exceeds all that we can know or imagine? Our inclination is to picture God as somehow like us, only bigger and better. This is to speak of God univocally, to assume that our words mean just the same thing, whether we say them of God or of creatures. But when God is conceived in this way, it soon looks like God’s activity must interfere with the agency of creatures whether with human freedom or with contingency and chance in nature. There is therefore an urgent need in theology today to recover the language of analogy, which begins with the affirmation that God is not like us. Fr. Michael hopes to instill in his students an integration of Classical Philosophy and Theology with current questions and issues. His teaching style evokes a Socratic dialogue with his students, which at least initially involves not so much supplying answers as exploring questions. He enjoys interacting with students, exchanging ideas, allowing the tradition to challenge student and student to challenge the tradition. The courses Fr. Michael Dodds teaches are: * Philosophy of Nature * Philosophical Anthropology * One Creator God * The Trinity * Theological Anthropology * Divine Action * God and Suffering Fr. Michael is currently working on a book about Divine Action. Given the scientific account of causality and the world, how can we conceive of God as acting in the world and causing events? His other academic interests are: Theology and Science; Thomas Aquinas; and Theodicy and