Books by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
The Catholic University of America Press, 2019
Grace, Predestination, and the Permission of Sin seeks to analyze a revisionist movement within T... more Grace, Predestination, and the Permission of Sin seeks to analyze a revisionist movement within Thomism in the 20th century over and against the traditional or classical Thomistic commentatorial treatment of physical premotion, grace, and the permission of sin, especially as these relate to the mysteries of predestination and reprobation.
The over-arching critique leveled by the revisionists against the classic treatment is that Bañezian scholasticism had disregarded the dissymmetry between the line of good (God's causation of salutary acts) and the line of evil (God's permission of defect and sin).
The teaching of St. Thomas is explored via intimate consideration of his texts. The thought of St. Thomas is then compared with the work of Domingo Bañez and the foremost 'Bañezian' of the 20th century, Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange.
The work then shifts to a consideration of the major players of the revisionist treatment, including Francisco Marín-Sola, Jacques Maritain, and Bernard Lonergan. Jean-Herve Nicolas is also taken up as one who had held both accounts during his lifetime.
The work analyzes and critiques the revisionist theories according to the fundamental tenets of the classical account. Upon final analysis, it seeks to show that the classical account sufficiently distances God's causal role in regard to free salutary acts and His non-causal role in regard to free sinful acts. Moreover, the revisionist account presents significant metaphysical problems and challenges major tenets of classical theism, such as the divine omnipotence, simplicity, and the exhaustive nature of divine providence.
Finally, the implications of the traditional view are considered in light of the spiritual life. It is argued that the classical account is the only one which provides an adequate theological foundation for the Church's robust mystical and spiritual tradition, and in particular, the abandonment to divine providence.
Books In Writing by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
Papers Published by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
Lux Veritatis: A Journal of Speculative Theology, Vol. I, No. 1 , 2024
Nova et Vetera 21, no. 2, 2023
Reality: A Journal for Philosophical Discourse , 2020
This paper uses Garrigou-Lagrange in order to explore the wider question of a Thomistic response ... more This paper uses Garrigou-Lagrange in order to explore the wider question of a Thomistic response to personalism and the thought of Jacques Maritain. How ought Thomistic thinkers to conceive of the individual and person distinction so widely utilized by the personalists? Does usage of this distinction necessitate personalism as condemned by Charles De Koninck and his reading of St. Thomas on the common good? Certainly, it is surprising that Garrigou-Lagrange utilized personalist jargon given his other theological views. In short, this article argues that the individual-person distinction can be used in two very different ways: as congruent with St. Thomas and De Koninck and as incongruent with them. Garrigou provides an example of the former, elucidating a properly Thomistic understanding of the relation between the primacies of the person and the common good. Jacques Maritain provides an example of the latter. Upon final analysis, we may make some important claims about nature and grace, the individual and the state, etc. by utilizing language shared with adherents of personalism but without abandoning the important thought of De Koninck on the primacy of the common good.
Ecce Mater Tua: A Journal of Mariology , 2019
This article outlines the implications of the Thomistic understanding of predestination for Mario... more This article outlines the implications of the Thomistic understanding of predestination for Mariology, providing for a robust understanding of her grace and the great intimacy between Mary and Christ. It is, I think, a speculative treatment with spiritual implications. The work argues along lines espoused by St. Thomas and St. Augustine (and developed by the Thomistic commentators, especially Garrigou-Lagrange who plays prominently herein) that it is Mary’s divine maternity which is the source and cause of her plentitude of grace. Her free cooperation with God’s grace effects a most fitting mother, not just of Christ’s human nature, but a mother of the unified Person of Jesus Christ.
The Heythrop Journal , Oct 17, 2019
Jacques Maritain cited Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange as having been one of the Thomists who had wor... more Jacques Maritain cited Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange as having been one of the Thomists who had worked toward a revision of the traditional Thomistic, Banezian treatment of providence, reprobation, and the permission of sin. For Maritain, it was specifically the antecedent permissive decree which made God out to be an indirect cause of sin and thus the one primarily responsible for it. Maritain thought that a rejection of the antecedent permissive decree was absolutely necessary to preserve God’s innocence. This paper attempts to show that Garrigou employed a new approach to the topic which is nonetheless completely consistent with the Thomistic tradition. Garrigou is concerned with safeguarding against an overly harsh treatment of reprobation which, in over-stressing God’s providential reign over all things (sin included) could make the traditional treatment vulnerable to modern concerns over theodicy. However, Garrigou utilizes the traditional treatment, formulating it in order to place emphasis upon man’s causal role in sin so as to speak to the concerns of his time, many of which are found within Maritain’s critique. The change in emphasis in no way negates the traditional treatment. Garrigou fully embraces the antecedent permissive decree and the robust sense of providence found throughout the earlier tradition.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/heyj.12379/full
Book Chapters by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
Hope and Death: Christian Responses
(Steubenville, OH: Emmaus Academic, 2022)
Wisdom and Wonder: How Peter Kreeft Shaped the Next Generation of Catholics, 2021
(San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2021)
T & T Clark Companion to Divine Providence
Forthcoming
Mother Teresa and the Mystics: Toward a Renewal of Spiritual Theology, 2018
(Ave Maria, FL: Sapientia Press, 2018)
Book Reviews by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
Nova et Vetera, 2020
Press, 2019), 222 PP. WHAT CAN ONE SAY about David Bentley Hart's That AU Shall Be Saved: It does... more Press, 2019), 222 PP. WHAT CAN ONE SAY about David Bentley Hart's That AU Shall Be Saved: It does not seem to be a text which admits of moderate responses. Its readers seem almost exclusively to laud it as a new epoch in Christian theology or to condemn it as a screed of ad hominems which rejects the vast majority of Christians throughout history. Still, one wants to be as positive as one can, if for no other reason than that after reading That Al! Shall Be Saved one thirsts desperately for even a drop of irenicism. I have three major thoughts about Hart's work, which is broken up into four "Meditations." My first thought deals with the mode of Hart's prose and argumentation; the second and third deal briefly with two of the argu ments themselves.
http://readingreligion.org/books/divine-providence
Popular Publications by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
Teaching the Faith 12, no. 08, 2023
The Church: The One and the Many Most Catholics are well aware of the lines of Matthew 16.18-19 (... more The Church: The One and the Many Most Catholics are well aware of the lines of Matthew 16.18-19 ("On this rock. . ."). These lines are probably the most striking and obvious scriptural evidence for Our Lord's institution of the papacy. And it is clear from today's reading from Isaiah that, even before the Incarnation, it was God's will to institute both a visible Church and leaders of that Church. In truth, the Church is not, as so many suppose today, a kind of manmade, social apparatus which just so happened to spring up around the message of the Gospel. The foundation of the Church is a constitutive element of the mission of the Incarnation. In just the next chapter of Romans, St. Paul reminds us that, "For as in one body we have many parts, and all the parts do not have the same function, so we, though many, are one body in Christ and individually parts of one another" (Rom 12.4-5). In a mysterious way, the Church becomes the body of Christ, that is, all of those who have given themselves to Christ and are baptized into the Church of His institution, become one with Him and with each other. Together, with Christ, we act as the flesh of this new body, which is animated by the soul of the Holy Spirit (Thomas Aquinas, Exposition on the Apostle's Creed, a. 9). As St. Paul intimates, just as a human body has many parts, complementary in their differences and yet united together in a single identity, so each of us has our own place and role to play within the Church. The Second Vatican Council teaches us that, though these roles are disparate, each is vitally important and each comes with a call to radical holiness (Lumen gentium, 5). In regard to what is most important, that is, knowledge and love of God, we are all called similarly and to the same degree of holiness. For some, this may be a comfort. To one who feels as if they are a second-class citizen in the Church on account of their not being a bishop, or a priest, or a nun, it can be a comfort to hear that we are still called to the same holiness. But this should also be a challenge to us. Imagine the sort of responsibility to holiness that would burden us if we were suddenly made pope. Yet, whatever our station within the Church, we are called to just this maximal degree of holiness. The Import of the Bishop, the Shepherd of Unity With the universal call to holiness being stated, it ought to be mentioned that such universality actually requires and presupposes a certain hierarchical structure in the Church. Just as the body, in order to function properly, needs disparate parts of different functions which are given various attention (the head is given much more thought than, say, the spleen), so the Church too needs people to fill all of its various roles and offices. The pope will receive much more attention than I ever will, but this does not do away with the universal call to holiness nor our reciprocal need for each other. What is a shepherd without his sheep? And what becomes of the sheep without a shepherd?
Church Life Journal, 2022
Church Life Journal, 2022
Church Life Journal, 2019
Church Life Journal, 2018.
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Books by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
The over-arching critique leveled by the revisionists against the classic treatment is that Bañezian scholasticism had disregarded the dissymmetry between the line of good (God's causation of salutary acts) and the line of evil (God's permission of defect and sin).
The teaching of St. Thomas is explored via intimate consideration of his texts. The thought of St. Thomas is then compared with the work of Domingo Bañez and the foremost 'Bañezian' of the 20th century, Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange.
The work then shifts to a consideration of the major players of the revisionist treatment, including Francisco Marín-Sola, Jacques Maritain, and Bernard Lonergan. Jean-Herve Nicolas is also taken up as one who had held both accounts during his lifetime.
The work analyzes and critiques the revisionist theories according to the fundamental tenets of the classical account. Upon final analysis, it seeks to show that the classical account sufficiently distances God's causal role in regard to free salutary acts and His non-causal role in regard to free sinful acts. Moreover, the revisionist account presents significant metaphysical problems and challenges major tenets of classical theism, such as the divine omnipotence, simplicity, and the exhaustive nature of divine providence.
Finally, the implications of the traditional view are considered in light of the spiritual life. It is argued that the classical account is the only one which provides an adequate theological foundation for the Church's robust mystical and spiritual tradition, and in particular, the abandonment to divine providence.
Books In Writing by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
Papers Published by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/heyj.12379/full
Book Chapters by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
Book Reviews by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
Popular Publications by Taylor Patrick O'Neill
The over-arching critique leveled by the revisionists against the classic treatment is that Bañezian scholasticism had disregarded the dissymmetry between the line of good (God's causation of salutary acts) and the line of evil (God's permission of defect and sin).
The teaching of St. Thomas is explored via intimate consideration of his texts. The thought of St. Thomas is then compared with the work of Domingo Bañez and the foremost 'Bañezian' of the 20th century, Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange.
The work then shifts to a consideration of the major players of the revisionist treatment, including Francisco Marín-Sola, Jacques Maritain, and Bernard Lonergan. Jean-Herve Nicolas is also taken up as one who had held both accounts during his lifetime.
The work analyzes and critiques the revisionist theories according to the fundamental tenets of the classical account. Upon final analysis, it seeks to show that the classical account sufficiently distances God's causal role in regard to free salutary acts and His non-causal role in regard to free sinful acts. Moreover, the revisionist account presents significant metaphysical problems and challenges major tenets of classical theism, such as the divine omnipotence, simplicity, and the exhaustive nature of divine providence.
Finally, the implications of the traditional view are considered in light of the spiritual life. It is argued that the classical account is the only one which provides an adequate theological foundation for the Church's robust mystical and spiritual tradition, and in particular, the abandonment to divine providence.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/heyj.12379/full
The over-arching critique leveled by the revisionists against the classic treatment is that Bañezian scholasticism had disregarded the dissymmetry between the line of good (God's causation of salutary acts) and the line of evil (God's permission of defect and sin).
The teaching of St. Thomas is explored via intimate consideration of his texts. The thought of St. Thomas is then compared with the work of Domingo Bañez and the foremost 'Bañezian' of the 20th century, Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange.
The work then shifts to a consideration of the major players of the revisionist treatment, including Francisco Marín-Sola, Jacques Maritiain, and Bernard Lonergan. Jean-Herve Nicolas is also taken up as one who had held both accounts during his lifetime.
The work analyzes and critiques the revisionist theories according to the fundamental tenets of the classical account. Upon final analysis, it seeks to show that the classical account sufficiently distances God's causal role in regard to free salutary acts and His non-causal role in regard to free sinful acts. Moreover, the revisionist account presents significant metaphysical problems and challenges major tenets of classical theism, such as the divine omnipotence, simplicity, and the exhaustive nature of divine providence.
Finally, the implications of the traditional view are considered in light of the spiritual life. It is argued that the classical account is the only one which provides an adequate theological foundation for the Church's robust mystical and spiritual tradition.