Saint Thomas Aquinas

Thomas Aquinas (LBW March 7) –

January 28 – St. Thomas Aquinas – (Roccasecca, 1225 – Fossanova, 7 March 1274), also Thomas of Aquin or Aquino, was an Italian Dominican priest of the Catholic Church, and an immensely influential philosopher and theologian in the tradition of scholasticism, known as Doctor Angelicus, Doctor Communis, or Doctor Universalis. “Aquinas” is not a surname (hereditary surnames were not then in common use in Europe), but is a Latin adjective meaning “of Aquino”, his place of birth. He was the foremost classical proponent of natural theology, and the father of Thomism. His influence on Western thought is considerable, and much of modern philosophy was conceived as a reaction against, or as an agreement with his ideas, particularly in the areas of ethics, natural law, metaphysics, and political theory.