What is the relationship between the gifts of the Holy Spirit and the action of grace?
Meinert reads Aquinas’s thought on the gifts of the Holy
Spirit and grace in an integral and analogous way. Not only does The Love of God Poured Out aid
scholars in understanding Aquinas’s thought on these two issues, it
also once more clarifies the truth that the Holy Spirit and his gifts
are neither a devout appendix to moral theology nor a pious nod to
tradition. They are the heart and height of the moral life, a life lived
subditus Deo.
Pages: 312. Hardcover.
About the author:
John Meinert, PhD, is Assistant Professor of Theology at Franciscan
Missionaries of Our Lady University in Baton Rouge, LA. He is the author
of a moral theology textbook, Life in Christ, for Verbum Software (2016). His research has appeared in Nova et Vetera, The Angelicum, New Blackfriars, and Augustinian Studies.
Endorsements:
“Meinert stands squarely in the line of Pinckaers-influenced
post-Vatican II Catholic moral theologians who deploy ressourcement
Thomism to articulate the life of graced discipleship. The Love of God
Poured Out is as technical and careful an inquiry as even the most
ardent Thomist commentator could demand. Yet for all its command of
Aquinas’s texts and his twentieth-century commentators, it rests on a
very simple premise: We can better understand Aquinas’s thought on grace
by attending to the gifts of the Holy Spirit and, conversely, we can
better understand Thomas’s thought on the gifts of the Holy Spirit by
turning to Thomas’s thought on grace.”
—William C. Mattison III, University of Notre Dame
“John Meinert argues convincingly that the Holy Spirit and his gifts
are at the heart of Thomas Aquinas’s mature portrayal of the Christian
life. Students of Aquinas often neglect the centrality of the gifts.
Meinert’s book offers a timely corrective by showing how for Aquinas the
gifts of the Holy Spirit are not the reserve of a chosen few, nor are
they occasional aids that assist the Christian from time to time.
Instead, for Thomas Aquinas, the gifts of the Holy Spirit render the
Christian receptive to the Spirit’s animating action in all the events
of daily life. Specialists will find Meinert’s book particularly helpful
because he both details the different schools of Thomistic
interpretation and draws on Aquinas’s treatise on grace to offer a
convincing account of Thomas Aquinas’s mature theology.”
—Michael Sherwin, O.P., University of Fribourg
“In The Love of God Poured Out, John Meinert analyzes two
very important concepts in Thomas Aquinas’s moral theology: grace and
the gifts of the Holy Spirit. These topics have been vastly
underappreciated and misunderstand in the past, and Meinert has all the
scholarly skills that are necessary to both appreciate their important
role in Aquinas’s thought and to understand them properly. He uses his
excellent grasp of the deeper metaphysical issues, the Thomistic corpus
as a whole (especially the biblical commentaries), and the secondary
literature to show the centrality of grace and the Holy Spirit in the
moral life. This profound and well-researched book will provide an
excellent resource for those seeking a better understanding of Thomistic
theology.”
—John Rziha, Benedictine College