The XII Plenary Session of the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas ended Sunday with a Mass celebrated by Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Secretary of State of the Vatican. In his homily, which focused on the mystery of the Eucharist, Cardinal Bertone spoke about the "profound and luminous faith" of St. Thomas Aquinas in the Blessed Sacrament.
The Plenary Session of the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas had as its theme “The Thomistic Legacy of Blessed John Paul II.”
The Academy was reformed by Bd. Pope John Paul in 1999, following his encyclical “Fides in ratio” in which he called for a renewal of Thomistic thought.
Among the speakers at the three-day event was Cardinal Francis George of Chicago. He says Bd. John Paul "re-invigorated the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas." Citing Fides in ratio, Cardinal George says that St. Thomas "remains the primary thinker in our history who brings together faith and reason - as Pope John Paul II did."
"One of the ways he did that," Cardinal George continues, "was to use phenomenology in a way similar to the way Aquinas used Aristotle. That is, faith in conversation with philosophical studies comes to develop theologies that change from time to time. Faith remains the same, but theologies can be different, because some philosophies, which are the works of human reason, are better able to grapple with the mysteries of faith than are others."