Christ's Role in Sanctification According to St. Thomas Aquinas

Abstract

This study investigates Aquinas' understanding of Christ's role in sanctification. In discussing the soteriological effect of Christ's passion, Aquinas makes a distinction between the manner in which the soteriological effect is brought about (modo efficiendi), the effect in itself, and the way the effect is obtained. The dissertation explores Aquinas' understanding of the third element - the securing of the effect of Christ's passion - and the relation of this third element to the first two. Sanctifying grace is given as a result of Christ's saving acts, is infused by an act of the Holy Spirit, and conforms its recipients to the Holy Spirit. But Christ's role in sanctification does not cease once the Holy Spirit is given. In Aquinas' judgment, Christ continues to be present in the giving of the gift, a giving that is also consequent upon a being conformed to Christ. The dissertation builds toward an examination of how Aquinas understands this being conformed to Christ, especially in light of Aquinas' conception of faith as a knowledge of God, of Christ as the source and object of faith's knowledge, and of charity's relation to this knowledge, all of which are analyzed against Aquinas' strict adherence to the principle that humans cannot know God in his essence so long as they remain in time