Aquinas: For Arm Chair Theologians Analysis

Overall, Aquinas: for Arm Chair Theologians, by Timothy M. Renick makes several interesting and valid points about evil, free will, and the omnipresence/ omnipotence of God. Renick also provided an interesting analysis of Aquinas’ understanding of God’s existence in time and space. Personally, I agreed with most of what Renick and Aquinas thought about God. I strongly disagree with Calvin and Luther’s idea of predestination. I agree that God gave us all free will, that God is above time, that he chooses what he wants to know and what he doesn’t want to know, and that God does not create catastrophes or evil but that he provides us with the resources and matter to create evil. One of Aquinas’ most profound ideas is that God can make things happen (necessitate them) or allow them to naturally work themselves out and will things to happen in if certain other things happen (contingent). He gives us free will to choose our own fate because he loves us

Aquinas made a valid point out demonstrating how God can make things happen or he can just let them play out. God doesn’t always want to know everything and sometimes he just goes with the flow. Another great point is that God gives us free will so that we can make our own decisions. Free will makes it so we can make good or bad choices but the important thing is that we’re the ones making our own decisions. I believe that one of the most important points that the article makes is that God is above time and exists infinitely and will never die. Even though God knows what we are going to do before we do it he chooses to let us live our life accordingly and how we want to. The last point that I agree with is that God does not create evil. He creates the resources that we then can use towards evil. We are the ones who choose to act using evil and how we are going to act while using evil. I enjoyed this article and agreed with most of the points that Aquinas has