Our passions draw us out into “engagement with the world.” This engagement is not random or according to the whim of the subject, but is already ordered by an apprehension of the good, either sensible or intelligible. Love is the primary passion toward the good. All other passions in some manner depend on love, insofar … Continue reading Passions and Engagement
A Few Poems by Beatrice Spun (age 9) The Whale; The whale had a bump; the whale had a hump. Their were two whales; each had a bump: each had a hump: each had a lump. One went away. The whale had a hump: the whale had a bump. The Tree A tree starts out … Continue reading Poems from a Guest Writer
If we thought like angels or God, we could wake up in the morning and immediately know that dad was in the kitchen making breakfast. We would not need to move through the senses, reflect on things, refer to memory, analyze, make inferences, and draw conclusions. We would simply know. Instead, there is an order … Continue reading Someone’s in the Kitchen: On the Order and Beauty of Human Learning
In adjudicating between two opposite errors of political (and thus anthropological) philosophy, Jacque Maritain capitalizes on the distinction between our material individuality and our personhood. These are not, as he points out, two separate realities, but two aspects of one reality. By the fact of our materiality, we are individuals: needy, fragile, and insufficient of … Continue reading On Maritain’s Person and the Common Good
One of the challenges of a hylomorphic theory is articulating in what sense the soul is a spiritual substance. This is because the soul is the form of the body, even while every single body that exists has some form. A tree has a form. In fact, the form of a tree is also a soul. … Continue reading Spiritual Souls vs. Material Souls
Last week, I mentioned what will not be taken from us if we choose what is better: “Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her” (Luke 10:42). Here is how Thomas Aquinas puts it in his mediation on the relationship between the Contemplative and Active life: Sometimes a … Continue reading Thomas’s Take on Life Interrupted
One of the most charming moments of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Hobbit takes place at Beorn’s farm when Gandalf tells his host their tale. By twos and threes, the dwarves intrude, interrupting Gandalf’s narrative. In part, this is intended to soften the blow of fourteen unexpected visitors arriving all at once. Yet for a moment, one might wonder if … Continue reading Tolkien on How to Tell (Interrupt) a Story
