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In an obituary that appeared in The Times on July 21st 1903, Leo XIII (1810-
1903) was hailed as ‘… the greatest Pope to have governed the Roman
Catholic Church since the French Revolution.’1 It is true that Leo was deeply
immersed in the cultural life of his own century and that one of the aims of his
pontificate was to make it possible for the Church to engage philosophically
with contemporary thought and to make its own contributions to the
integration of European culture. The way in which this was to be achieved
was set out in his 1879 encyclical Aeterni Patris: scholars were to be
encouraged to investigate and assimilate the scholastic tradition and to use
the ‘perennial’ philosophy and theology of St Thomas Aquinas (1225-74) –
linked to the tradition of the Church Fathers and maintaining an openness to
the best insights of scholars of different philosophical persuasions – to
rejuvenate the continent’s intellectual and religious life, so deeply undermined
by the ‘ravages’ of the Enlightenment and the French Revolution. In section 1
I describe the circumstances that led to the rehabilitation of Thomism as a
serious option for nineteenth century Catholic philosophers and its
endorsement in Aeterni Patris; in sections 2 and 3 I explain and comment on
two strains of twentieth century Thomistic interpretation, Aristotelian and
Transcendental Thomism; finally, in section 4, I discuss the apparent
recommendation of a third strain, Existential Thomism, by Pope John Paul II
in his encyclical Fides et Ratio.
1
Quoted in the entry on Leo XIII in the Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia, 1993-2001 Microsoft
Corporation.
1
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The ‘story’ that culminated in Aeterni Patris contains some interesting ironies
and coincidences. By the 1750’s, ‘second scholasticism’ (the great revival of
scholastic thought after the Council of Trent (1545-63)) was in serious decline.
The educated elite, influenced by the perceived freshness of modern
Enlightenment philosophy, regarded scholasticism with a thinly-veiled
contempt. The suppression of the Jesuit order in 1722 effectively terminated
the influence of (Suárezian) Thomism on Catholic students in European
colleges. Following the persecution and suppression of the Catholic Church
during the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, scholasticism
gradually ceased to be a viable option for Catholic theologians who wanted to
engage with a secular culture that considered all versions of Thomism as
philosophically discredited. Indeed it was to Post-Kantian idealism, rather than
to traditional scholasticism, that the Church (in Germany, at least) turned to
resource itself philosophically in the first half of the nineteenth century. In
Rome, at the Gregorian University (returned to the restored Society of Jesus
by Pope Leo XII in 1824), there was no great enthusiasm for the scholastic
tradition. Luigi Taparelli d’Azeglio, who did favour the philosophy of St
Thomas, was resisted quite vehemently by the resident Jesuit professors
when he tried to introduce a curriculum based on Thomistic philosophy.
By contrast with the Jesuits, the Dominicans did try to maintain the viability of
the tradition of St Thomas during the political and cultural upheavals of this
period. In Italy, the most influential Thomist thinkers were the Dominicans
Tommaso Zigliara (who won the confidence of the Bishop of Perugia,
Giaocchino Pecci, the future Leo XIII) and Alberto Lepidi. Lepidi’s (he was
Regent at the Dominican College of Flavigny from 1868-1873) argumentative
rigour and exacting intellectual standards helped to re-establish Thomism for
many outside his order and certainly had a decisive influence on what would
be Bishop Pecci’s future agenda for the Church. St Thomas’ most influential
disciple in Northern Europe was the Jesuit Joseph Kleutgen. Interestingly, in
2
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So much for one of the ironies, but what of the coincidences? These consist
in a remarkable chain of events that leads from two young Italian seminarians
to Leo XIII’s encyclical. The two young seminarians were Serafino and
Domenico Sordi, both students at the Collegio Alberoni at Piacenza. They
were both enthusiasts for the philosophy of St Thomas. Later, after joining the
Society of Jesus, they made a significant Thomist convert of Luigi Taparelli.5
The latter shared his enthusiasm with fellow student and future pope,
Giaocchino Pecci. The Sordis made further converts of Carlo Maria Curci,
Matteo Liberatore and Guiseppe Pecci (Giovanni’s brother and future
cardinal). In 1846 Pope Pius IX felt constrained by the ‘misunderstanding’ of
nature and grace in some non-scholastic theologies to defend the power of
reason to recognise the credibility of revelation and make a reasonable act of
faith. Twinned to this apologetic aim, Pope Pius, through the establishment of
the review, Civilità cattolica (staffed by Jesuits), sought to reach out to and
influence the thinking of the educated classes of Italy. Matteo Liberatore
joined the staff of the review and Joseph Kleutgen was appointed as the
‘German expert’ for the Congregation of the Index. Both were well placed to
promote traditional scholasticism and to undermine efforts to introduce newer,
non-Thomist philosophies. Liberatore was a brilliant writer and polemicist. In
the review he presented Thomism as a compelling, fully integrated and
coherent modern system of philosophy. For his part, Kleutgen presented wave
after wave of persuasive argument in favour of his view that perennial
scholastic theology was far better equipped to expound and defend
2
Ronald McCamy, Out of a Kantian Chrysalis? A Maritainian Critique of Fr. Marechal, Peter
Lang 1998.
3
His reference is to Gerald McCool’s Catholic Thought in the Nineteenth Century, New York:
Seabury, 1977.
4
The point is developed below on page 9.
5
See p. 2
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one. Cajetan, however, affirmed that there was an act of existence really
distinct from the essence that limited it. Given these variations it becomes
germane to ask: which version(s) of Thomism/neo-scholasticism were taken
up by theologians at the turn of the century and was the awareness of the
Thomism’s historical character a fillip behind the development of one
interpretation that showed greater openness to the ‘secular’ thought of the
nineteenth and early twentieth centuries?
2: Aristotelian Thomism
In what way is the real appropriated through the concept? To answer this, it
will be necessary to provide a brief account of the Aristotelian-Thomist
7
See Robert Harvanek, Philosophical Pluralism in the New Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol 11,
New York: McGraw-Hill 1967, pp 448-451.
5
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3: Transcendental Thomism
8
The précis I provide is modelled on the kind of summary offered to many seminarians
following philosophy courses in the first half of the 20th century, up to Vatican II. I have drawn
on a couple of seminary manuals: An Introduction to Philosophy by Msgr Paul Glenn, Herder,
1944 and An Introduction to Philosophy by Daniel Sullivan, Bruce, 1957.
9
See Sullivan, op. cit. p. 65.
10
The authors do not suggest that the act of knowing involves any kind of temporal sequence;
the different stages can be identified as a result of logical analysis.
11
The concept has to be distinguished from the term which is the outward expression of the
concept (by means of a conventional sign such as a word). Aristotelian-Thomism suggests
that the term expresses a concept completely (once its meaning has been fully and
competently unpacked). It is also important to emphasise that the proper object of knowledge
is the reality, not the concept. The concept is the medium through which the reality of the
object is encountered.
6
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12
See McCamy, op. cit. p 14
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John Knasas has observed that several currents of Thomism (including the
Aristotelian) streamed into Vatican II but, as a matter of fact, only Maréchal’s
Transcendental Thomism emerged with any vibrancy.14 It might be germane to
point out some of the attractions that Maréchal’s reworking of Thomism would
have had for some Catholic theologians working in the pre-Conciliar period.
Maréchal’s implied pluralism avoids any commitment to a single and definitive
metaphysics as the crown of man’s natural powers. The Aristotelian-Thomist
position suggests a view of human nature as being so integrated that grace
appears as irrelevant and superfluous. Maréchal’s human nature, by contrast,
is a dynamism to infinite being, a profound longing that can be quieted only by
God. As already observed (page 4) Étienne Gilson’s historical studies showed
that the thinking of scholastic philosophers is as individual as fingerprints. The
Aristotelian-Thomist position is clearly too ahistorical and the Maréchalian
perspective (concepts forming in the wake of intellectual dynamism)
reasonably accommodates the undeniable pluralism in human thinking.
Finally, as against Aristotelian-Thomism’s unappealingly relentless,
13
See John FX Knasas, The Twentieth Century Thomistic Revival, on
www.secondspring.co.uk/archive/knasas.htm. page 2/9
14
See op. cit. p 3/9
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Two of the most original theologians of the twentieth century, Karl Rahner and
Bernard Lonergan, emerged from the tradition of Maréchal and further
developed his thought to show that a philosophical and theological method
based on the finality of the human mind can continue to present a concept of
invariant truth in a theology marked by history and pluralism. As ‘new
theologians’, working in the context of post-Conciliar theology, however, many
have questioned whether their work belongs to the history of the Neo-Thomist
movement. John Knasas goes so far as to suggest that being a theologian in
the post-Conciliar period means, by definition, working outside the Thomist
framework: ‘The history of the modern Neo-Thomist movement, whose
magna carta was Aeterni Patris, reached its end at the Second Vatican
Council.’16 In a telling observation, Gerald McCool noted that the seeds of
Neo-Thomism’s own demise could be discerned, quite ironically, in the
philosophy of one of Aristotelian Thomism’s most vocal advocates, namely
Joseph Kleutgen. McCool is able to detect elements of both traditional and
transcendental versions of Thomism abiding in latent opposition in Kleutgen’s
work, two tendencies that will catalyze later into the ferment of the nouvelle
théologie. As he writes, ‘With Kleutgen … the end is in the beginning.’17
‘Demise’, of course, does not mean disappearance; Thomism in its various
forms continued and continues to have its advocates. The demise of Thomism
in this context means the end of its influence as a monolithic philosophical-
theological party line after the Second Vatican Council. This has to be seen as
a corollary of Maréchal’s relativisation of the concept and consequent
15
See Knasas op. cit p. 7/9
16
Knasas, op.cit. p. 7/9.
17
See Catholic Thought in the Nineteenth Century, op. cit p. 3
9
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11
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21
See John Paul II’s Angelicum Address on the centenary of Leo XIII’s encyclical Aeterni
Patris, delivered in 1979.
12
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Concluding remarks
4088 words
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Books:
13
From Aeterni Patris to Fides et Ratio: towards theological pluralism or a reaffirmation of philosophia perennis?
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John Knasas, Thomist Metaphysics Past, Present and Future, Center for Thomistic
Studies, University of St Thomas, Houston, Texas, USA.
Knasas, Whither the Neo-Thomsit Revival? Logos: A Journal of Catholic Thought and
Culture 3.4 (2000) 121-149
14
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