From: richarra@gmail.com   
      
   St. Thomas Aquinas commenting on Romans 13:1 wrote:   
      
   "...natural generation is not the only grounds for calling a   
   person--father.' There are all kinds of reasons why some should be   
   given this title, and each of these kinds of fatherhood deserves   
   corresponding respect. [...]. Kings and princes are called fathers   
   because they should look after the welfare of their people. Them also   
   we honor with our obedience. And we do so not only out of fear but out   
   of love; not only for reasons of human convenience but because our   
   conscience tells us to act in this way. The reason for this is based   
   on the fact, as the Apostle says in this passage, that all authority   
   comes from God; therefore, one must give every one what is his due."   
   Aquinas: On the two commandments of love and the ten commandments of the Law,   
   IV   
      
      
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   January 28th - St. Thomas Aquinas   
   (c. 1225 – 1274)   
      
   “Angelic Doctor” and “Doctor Communis” (“Everybody’s Teacher”)   
   are   
   only two of the terms of praise bestowed on St. Thomas Aquinas, the   
   most important and influential Catholic philosopher and theologian of   
   the Middle Ages.   
      
   Thomas was the youngest child of a member of the landed gentry, a   
   government official of Emperor Frederick II. Born at Roccasecca,   
   between Rome and Naples, Thomas was sent as a small child to the great   
   nearby Benedictine Abbey of Monte Cassino, whose abbot was a distant   
   relative of his family. The parents enrolled him there not only as a   
   student, but as an oblate. They hoped that he would become a monk, and   
   eventually abbot of Monte Cassino. Thus, they thought shrewdly, his   
   education and his life career would be taken care of.   
      
   It didn’t work out that way. In 1239, Emperor Frederick II took over   
   the monastery as a fortress, so the abbot had to send his oblates to   
   study at the University of Naples. There Thomas met his first   
   Dominican Fathers. Attracted by their ideals, he joined this “Order of   
   Preachers” in 1244. Both he and his Dominican superiors knew that his   
   parents would be mad, so they whisked him off to Rome. His mother was   
   hopping mad! She at once sent Rinaldo, her older son, to chase after   
   Thomas and bring him home. Rinaldo succeeded, and indeed, practically   
   kidnapped Tom. Only after a year of virtual imprisonment in his family   
   palazzo, did the young Dominican succeed in persuading his parent that   
   he really did prefer to be a member of that order than a Benedictine.   
      
   St. Dominic had founded the Order of Preachers to combat error by   
   teaching truth. That meant that his friars had to be very well   
   educated. Thomas was therefore sent to study at the order’s study   
   houses, first at Paris and then at Cologne. St. Albert the Great, one   
   of his professors, quickly saw that he had intellectual gifts of the   
   first order. Thenceforth, Albert became Thomas’ sponsor.   
      
   Thomas was called by his talents to an academic rather than a   
   missionary life. He taught at Paris, 1252-59; at Rome and elsewhere in   
   Italy, 1259-60; and again at Paris, 1269-72. His last teaching   
   assignment, 1272-74, was at Naples.   
      
   Meanwhile, to provide his students with texts, he turned out 20 books.   
   The most noted of his multi-volume works was his Summary of Theology   
   (Summa Theologiae), one of the most influential books ever written.   
   However, the average Catholic knows Aquinas best for the Eucharistic   
   piety he expressed in the office and Mass he (apparently) composed for   
   the feast of Corpus Christi. For this feast he wrote the lovely hymns   
   “O Salutaris Hostia,” “Tantum Ergo,” “Lauda Sion,” and “Adoro Te   
   Devote.” These are still used, in Latin or in translation, in Catholic   
   Eucharistic devotions.   
      
   In 1274 the pope commanded Thomas, as a theological expert, to attend   
   the ecumenical council about to open at Lyons, France. Thomas set out   
   obediently, although he was ill. Unfortunately, he died before he got   
   as far as Rome. Already revered as a mystic as well as an   
   intellectual, Thomas of Aquinas was canonized a saint in 1323, and his   
   body was enshrined at Toulouse, France. St. Pius V designated him a   
   doctor of the Church, and Leo XIII declared him patron of all Catholic   
   schools.   
      
   Despite his phenomenal brilliance, Thomas had always been a man of   
   humble obedience, prone to think of others as superior to himself.   
   When he first went to Paris to study, his companions nicknamed this   
   quiet, plump young man the “dumb Sicilian ox.” But when in class he   
   came forth with a sharp solution for a knotty problem, St. Albert   
   warned his class: “We call Brother Thomas ‘the dumb ox,’ but I tell   
   you that he will make his lowing heard to the uttermost parts of the   
   earth.”   
      
   Yet St. Thomas always submitted his writings to the judgement of the   
   Church. A year before his death, he also had some sort of mystical   
   experience that prompted him to stop further writing. “All that I have   
   written appears to be as much straw after the things that have been   
   revealed to me.”   
      
   What he had written were world classics. But how indeed, can even the   
   most creative of human beings match in skill the Creator of the world?   
   That was what the Angelic Doctor meant.   
      
      
   Saint Quote:   
   “May I receive the bread of angels, the King of kings and Lord of   
   lords, with humble reverence, with the purity and faith, the   
   repentance and love, and the determined purpose that will help to   
   bring me to salvation.  May I receive the sacrament of the Lord’s Body   
   and Blood, and its reality and power.  Amen.”   
   --St Thomas Aquinas   
      
   Bible Quote:   
   Now we are well aware that whatever the Law says is said for those who   
   are subject to the Law, so that every month may be silence, and the   
   whole world brought under the judgment of God. So then, no human being   
   can be found upright at the tribunal of God by keeping the Law; all   
   that the Law does is to tell us what is sinful. [Romans 3:19-20.]   
      
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   Prayer for Charitable Hearts   
      
   Thank You Lord for the many graces and blessings you have placed in my life.   
   I offer You my heart-felt gratitude for Your countless gifts to me each day.   
   In turn, dear Lord, help me to be aware of the needs of my least   
   sisters and brothers, and to respond to those those who are poor and   
   less fortunate with generous expressions of charity, kindness and   
   caring.   
   On that day Lord, when I finally stand before You to give an account   
   of my life, I pray I will hear you say, “Come O good and faithful   
   servant to share your Father’s joy, for when you saw me hungry,   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)