Aquinas, Ethics, and Philosophy of Religion: Metaphysics and Practice

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

acknowledgments Some of the material in this book is revised and amplified from previous publications: ‘‘Aquinas, Virtue, and Recent Epistemology,’’ Review of Metaphysics 52 (1999): 573–94; ‘‘Calvin and Hobbes: The Revival of Christian Philosophy’’ appeared in The Weekly Standard, December 24, 2001; ‘‘Kretzmann ’s Theism vs. Aquinas’s Theism: Interpreting the Summa contra Gentiles ,’’ The Thomist 62 (1998): 603–22; ‘‘Portraits of the Artist: Joyce, Nietzsche, and Aquinas,’’ in Beauty, Art, and the Polis, ed. Alice Ramos (Catholic University of America Press, 2000), 117–37; and ‘‘Review of The Metaphysics of Creation: Aquinas’s Natural Theology in Summa Contra Gentiles II,’’ in The Thomist 64 (2000): 309–13. I am grateful to these journals for allowing republication of revised material from these essays. The remote origins of the thinking for this book date all the way back to my undergraduate days at the University of Dallas, where I was fortunate to study under such distinguished Thomists as Mark Jordan and Frederick Wilhelmsen . Less remote promptings came from conversations—both in person and through their published works—with Alasdair MacIntyre, Ralph McInerny , John O’Callaghan, and David Solomon. While some of the material for this book was composed during my time in the philosophy department at Boston College, the idea for the book and the bulk of the writing occurred during my first two years as Dean of the Honors College at Baylor University. Those were turbulent years at Baylor but still remarkably productive, both in terms of the success we had in building a new Honors College and in terms of my own writing. I could not have succeeded in either arena were it not for the encouragement and example of two of the finest Christian scholars and administrators I have ever encountered: then president Robert Sloan, and then provost David Jeffrey. David, in particular, regularly encouraged the continuation of my scholarly work. Of course, behind every moderately sane administrator stands an indefatigable staff. I want to express particular gratitude to Paulette Edwards, the administrative assistant for the Honors College, whose organizational skills and devotion to the common good enable the Honors College to flourish and me the luxury of time for research and teaching. The manuscript itself profited from the helpful comments of Matthew Levering and from the best of sympathetic yet critical readers for Indiana Acknowledgments xvi University Press: Graham McAleer and Merold Westphal, the latter of whom is the general editor of the Indiana Series in the Philosophy of Religion. I am also grateful to Elizabeth Yoder for providing an astute eye in the stage of copyediting and to Miki Bird at Indiana University Press for assistance along the way. Dee Mortensen at Indiana University Press provided helpful comments as well as genial and good-spirited stewardship of the project at every stage. The final word of thanks goes to my wife, Stacey, who in tough moments in our marriage has occasionally and only half in jest reminded me of the Rolling Stones song, ‘‘You Can’t Always Get What You Want.’’ Marriage, at times a harsh school, is about getting what you need and ultimately giving what is needed to spouse and children. Wendell Berry writes that fidelity is meant to preserve the ‘‘possibility of devotion against the distractions of novelty ,’’ to prepare for the return of moments when ‘‘what we have chosen and what we desire are the same.’’ As we begin our twentieth year of marriage, I am grateful to say that those moments are, if not continuous, then nearly so, particularly when it comes to our common task of raising Lauren, Daniel, and Sara. Sanctification of the natural and the ordinary is, according to St. Thomas, what life is all about. In that task, we require, as instruments of grace, community, friendship, and examples. To our familial community and beyond , Stacey supplies all these. To Stacey, who helps make possible and enjoyable things much more important than the writing of scholarly tomes, I dedicate whatever there is here of a book. Aquinas, Ethics, and Philosophy of Religion ...