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Memorial of Saint Thomas Aquinas, priest and doctor of the Church
St. Thomas Aquinas
Feastday:
January 28
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St. Thomas Aquinas
St.
Thomas Aquinas, priest
and doctor
of the Church, patron of all universities
and of students. His feast day
is January 28th. He was born toward the end of the year 1226. He was the son of
Landulph, Count of Aquino, who, when St. Thomas was
five years old, placed him under the care of the Benedictines of Monte Casino.
His teachers were surprised at the progress he made, for he surpassed all his
fellow pupils in learning as well as in the practice of virtue.
When
he became of age to choose his state of life, St. Thomas renounced
the things of this world and resolved to enter the Order of St. Dominic in
spite of the opposition of his family. In 1243, at the age of seventeen, he
joined the Dominicans
of Naples. Some members of his family
resorted to all manner of means over a two year period to break his constancy. They
even went so far as to send an impure woman to
tempt him. But all their efforts were in vain and St. Thomas persevered
in his vocation. As a reward for his fidelity, God conferred
upon him the gift of perfect chastity, which has merited for him the title of
the "Angelic Doctor".
After
making his profession at Naples, he studied at Cologne under
the celebrated St. Albert the Great. Here he was nicknamed the "dumb
ox" because of his silent ways and huge size, but he was really a
brilliant student. At the age of twenty-two, he was appointed to teach in the
same city. At the same time, he also began to publish his first works. After
four years he was sent to Paris. The saint was then a priest. At the age of
thirty-one, he received his doctorate.
At Paris he was
honored with the friendship of the King, St. Louis, with whom he frequently
dined. In 1261, Urban
IV called him to Rome where he
was appointed to teach, but he positively declined to accept any ecclesiastical
dignity. St.
Thomas not only wrote (his writings filled twenty hefty tomes characterized
by brilliance of thought and lucidity of language), but he preached often and
with greatest fruit. Clement IV
offered him the archbishopric of Naples which
he also refused. He left the great monument of his learning, the "Summa
Theologica", unfinished, for on his way to the second Council of Lyons,
ordered there by Gregory X, he fell sick and died at the Cistercian monastery
of Fossa Nuova in 1274.
St.
Thomas was one of the greatest and most influential theologians of all time. He
was canonized in 1323 and declared Doctor of the
Church by Pope Pius V.
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