Why Summa Theologica?

Are you interested in finding the most effective method of communicating with individuals of different faiths?  Have you grown tired of or bored with engaging in endless apologetic argumentation where the goal is to defeat “the religious other” in a war of words?  Do you feel an increasing desire to learn how others view the world rather than to simply to prove them wrong?  If you do, then please join me in the journey of exploring these issues from a perspective of interfaith dialogue.

This blog serves an important need.  There are many venues where participants discuss topics within their own faith community.  Certainly, there forums with persons from a plurality of faiths engage one another, but do so with the goal to demonstrate how the faith of another is defective.  This site is different.  This site focuses on interreligious or interfaith dialogue between Evangelicals, Latter-day Saints, Catholics and others.

I’m interested in improving communication and in advancing true, open, and genuine dialogue on matters of faith, culture and society.  As the spoken word contains rich information that often is lost in a transcript, I enjoy audio files and hope to offer comments on the many audio resources on topics of interest.

Why Did you Choose Summa Theologica?

Summa Theologica is the title of a seminal work by St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), an Italian Catholic philosopher and theologian in the scholastic tradition.  Thomas drew freely from Muslim (Averroes), Jewish (Rabbi Moses or Maimonides) and Greek (Aristotle, who Thomas simply referred to as The Philosopher) sources in his writings. In that sense, he is a good model for interfaith dialogue and discussion.

No better guide could have been chosen than the clear-minded, analytic, synthetic, and sympathetic Thomas Aquinas. His extraordinary patience and fairness in dealing with erring philosophers, his approbation of all that was true in their writings, his gentleness in condemning what was false, his clear-sightedness in pointing out the direction to true knowledge in all its branches, his aptness and accuracy in expressing the truth — these qualities mark him as a great master not only for the thirteenth century, but for all times” (Catholic Encylopedia).

For these reasons, I’ve borrowed the moniker ‘aquinas’ (note: using a lowercase ‘a’) and hope to offer patience and fairness in dealing with these challenging issues.

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Comment Policy

Please comment.  All comments are moderated to benefit you, the reader, and to ensure high-quality discussion.  I welcome civil, charitable, courteous and responsible comments. I reserve the right to edit comments for clarity, style, length or other considerations.  Comments made by others do not necessarily represent my views.