Corrective Thomism

Ten or fifteen years ago, had you asked me about what kind of philosopher I was, I might have replied "I'm a Thomist" or maybe (more modestly but also more accurately) "I'm an amateur Thomist." Today, if you asked me the same question and I was in a reflective enough state of mind to answer rightly, I might reply that I am a "corrective Thomist."

What I mean by this response is not that I am a particular type of Thomist, e.g. a neo-Thomist or a scholastic-Thomist or an Aristotelian-Thomist; rather, I look to St. Thomas* to help correct my philosophy when I become aware of disagreement or error between us. The same may be said of my theology, in some sense. Thus, I need not know everything that St. Thomas teaches as a philosopher or as a theologian; I need not even agree with everything I do know of what he teaches--but when I encounter a disagreement, I try to take it very seriously and to discover whether this means I have an error in either my reasoning or the principles, axioms, or evidence from which I reason. Saint Thomas was not infallible, of course, but when I encounter a disagreement between us, I may then suspect that my conclusions are on less stable ground than I might have previously supposed.

Thus, I do ask at times "What would St. Thomas conclude here?" as a means of approaching what is likely true in this case.

I suppose that in another sense, my theology might be said to be "corrective Catholic." I strive to think as the Church does, often miss the mark, but take the teachings of the Church to be corrective in such a way that if I am made aware that there is a disagreement between what I believe and what the Church teaches, then I need to stop and discover where I have gone astray. Is the disagreement in conclusion running afoul of an actual dogma, of a doctrine, or merely of a pious opinion? Even the lattermost of these should give me some pause.

There is, indeed, one more important question still: what does God say is true here? What might the Father reveal? What might Jesus, the Son, teach? To what conclusion may the Holy Spirit lead me**?

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*Primarily, St. Thomas, but there are other reliable guides of course. He draws on many of them, and other stand upon his shoulders in turn.

**As a faithful Catholic, I would note that the Holy Spirit primarily leads us through the Church, offering the most direct correctives through the Church's infallible dogmas.